Back to the Past
by Abby Normal
Summary: Two teens from the 1910's rescued by their descendents in the 90's and get stuck in the 60's in a crossover between a classic 80's trilogy & the century's biggest blockbuster. COMPLETED
1. Saving History

Based on some characters and situations originated by James Cameron and Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale.  
  
Tommy and Fabrizio ran on Jack's orders to check for any more boats on the other side of the ship. Jack thought he'd never see them again. He just hoped they would find a boat for all of them. If they couldn't at least they might be able to find one for themselves. And he knew he could get Rose on this one. She was a woman they would let her on. There would be room for her. He kept repeating that to himself. He could at least save her. And he would.   
  
Unfortunately, Rose was one of the most stubborn people to grace the earth.  
  
"I'm not going without you, Jack." She shook her head not taking her eyes off him.  
  
"No you have to go now."  
  
Just then someone came up behind them and grabbed them each by the arms. Had Cal found them? No, it was someone else. A short man in his later twenties it seemed. He looked at the two of them for a moment as if to make sure he recognized them.  
  
"Please come with me." He pleaded. "I need to you get off of the ship now. I know a way. You need to come with me." Jack and Rose just stared for moment.  
  
"She's getting on this boat." Jack informed the stranger.  
  
"No, not without you, Jack, no."  
  
The man sighed heavily and considered his thought. "Listen, there's a boat letting on both men and women on the other side. You have to come."  
  
"Who are you?" Demanded Rose.  
  
"Please guys. I'm begging you."   
  
"Alright then." Jack agreed and led Rose in front of him, following the man. "Wait, if there's a boat I have to tell our friends."  
  
"Just come with me."   
  
"No, we have to get Tommy and Fabri."  
  
"Just keep going this way."  
  
"No! We can't leave without them! Please!" Jack couldn't just abandon them.  
  
His begging was no use. The man led them to a small rowboat waiting for them by the disappearing bow. They had to trek the icy cold water that was spilling over the deck again to reach it. It was a dinky little thing. Not one of Titanic's lifeboats. It also had this strange machine attached to the end. A boy, a little younger than Jack and Rose waited for them in the boat.   
  
"Where are we going? Who are you? Where are you taking us?" They may have been off the sinking ship, but they did not feel safe. Rose would not get until she knew what was going on. "What about our friends? My mother and Trudy too? Why just us?"  
  
"Please just get the hell in already! If they're meant to live they will! You're killing me, come on."  
  
They got in. The boy leaned over and pulled the chord the machine. It roared and startled the young couple.  
  
"It's okay. It's just the engine."  
  
"On a boat this small?" Jack asked.  
  
"Yeah. I'll explain later. This is Verne by the way. And you can call me Marty."  
  
"Mr. and Mrs. D?" Verne inquired concentrating on them. Marty slapped Verne's shoulder and shook his head. Jack and Rose didn't understand.   
  
"Why are you doing this just for us?" Rose turned her head back from the death and chaos behind them. In front of them there was only blackness in the moonless night.  
  
"My wife. I'll explain later."  
  
Marty held up his flashlight to reveal another boat up ahead. They all climbed on board. Another little boat approached them from the distance, but it wasn't very close yet.   
  
On board two more people awaited them: an old dog and a white-haired man in his sixties or seventies. Next, as if out of nowhere, another woman just appeared.  
  
"Jennifer!" Marty caught her as she fell down.   
  
"What happened?" She looked up at her husband.   
  
"There was a little problem with your great-grandfather. Remember he disappeared form the picture? It's a long story."   
  
"Huh…?" She was still dazed, but curiously examining the newcomers.   
  
"Remember all that stuff with our kids and my parents?"  
  
"What happened to Poppa Jack?"  
  
Jack and Rose stared at them blankly. Everyone but Marty was dressed strangely, they recognized almost no of the strange contraptions on this ship. And although they could no longer hear the screams of terror, when they looked out the window they could see the great ship in the distance. It looked so small. Despite the outrageous yet fortunate situation they shared a horrible guilt.  
  
"Look Jack, the stern, it's rising out of the water. What's happening?"  
  
"Rose…" He pulled her closer to him and turned to others. "What's going on?"  
  
Marty helped his wife to her feet. "Doc, you wanna handle this?"  
  
Doc walked over to them. No one knew how to deal with them. A couple of very scared, very confused kids.   
  
"We are from the future…your future."   
  
"How?" Rose didn't quite believe, but considering the situation she was almost forced to. "What about them?" She pointed towards the dying Titanic.   
  
The eccentric old man continued. "There were only four we knew for sure that died, but weren't supposed to, the last time someone used one our time machines something went horribly wrong altering the past and our present, that is the year 1996."  
  
"We tried to find you guys days before the berg hit, and make sure you met too, but we didn't anticipate how big a ship it could be. We thought we could just lead you guys to the collapsible C boat at the right time because it let men on too and we knew what time it left. Luckily we had this boat and another one that's coming waiting for us now just in case. Hopefully Mom and Jules'll back soon." Verne said.  
  
"Four? What you are talking about?" Jack managed to get out.  
  
Verne continued. "Yeah we screwed up something the last time we went back or forward or whatever the hell you wanna call it, through time and boom, history was changed. You and some other people didn't make it and were supposed to and some people we knew in our times just," he snapped his fingers, "disappeared. Totally erased from existence."  
  
No response.  
  
"Yeah, oh well, it's happened before." He looked over at Marty and Jennifer and shrugged.  
  
"What about them? You couldn't save them? All those people!" Rose was so overcome with emotion she started shaking. "What happens to them?!"  
  
Doc sighed. "As a wrong this tragedy may seem, for our time, it was supposed to happen. Now we've just get the future back to normal and that includes fixing your family."  
  
"That," Rose cried, "is not supposed to happen!"  
  
"We can't just sit here and watch!" Jack was shaking too.  
  
"Wait!" Jennifer was now on her feet. "The picture! Marty, Doctor Brown, the picture! Nana, Poppa… " She reached for an old framed picture on the table and handed it to youthful ancestors.   
  
It was a photograph of on a horse with a roller coaster in the background.  
  
Jack seemed to recognize it. "Santa Monica."  
  
Then he recognized himself slowly materializing into the picture seated behind Rose with his arms around her waste.  
  
"You." Rose said.  
  
Jennifer walked over to them with clean blankets and handed them to them. She looked at Jack and then at Rose. "I should have known it from the photographs, but you look just like my Uncle Gary and you look just like my cousin Julia. Don't they? I guess it's strange. I've just never seen you guys look so…young, before."   
  
"How exactly are we supposed to get them back to New York by the eighteenth? We don't have enough fuel if we want to use the flux capacitor and we won't make it in time if just sail in." Marty asked Doc.  
  
Jack looked out the porthole ruefully. "I don't think anybody's goin' to New York now."  
  
"If we use the DeLorean. It's almost fixed and it can cover miles and time at the same time now. We could try to get it off the boat."  
  
They decided to have Marty take Jack and Rose to the New York countryside on April 17th so they could find someplace to land undetected and get them back to the city by the next day.  
  
It was past 2 AM by now and Jack and Rose were letting it all sink in. (No pun intended.) They were seated in the DeLorean turned time machine while Marty squatted outside of the car and explained all the controls and what was going to happen and who Jennifer was to them and what happened to them. But as Doc had warned him so many times he refused to give them any information on the future or even the Titanic disaster itself. By this time they had been able to saw off the remains of the handcuffs on Jack's wrists and bandage them for they were badly bruised. They waited for Clara and Jules to return with the other two passengers.  
  
"…Now we're fully stocked on the plutonium, but we only have enough gas for one trip. It needs gasoline as much as it needs the plutonium and Mr. Fusion. To get this thing going you have get it up 88 miles per hour."  
  
"How? We'll sink? There's no roads." Asked Jack.  
  
"Where you're going you don't need roads…I mean it flies too. Actually then you can get this thing all the way up to 88 faster than on the ground, but then it's harder to control. It happens much quicker, so be careful, but you don't have worry about that I'll be driving and now we have keys to cars to get them started." He demonstrated. "You just stick it in the ignition, turn and there you go." The engine started without the big jolt and roar Rose and Jack were previously accustomed to.   
  
Rose looked out towards the Titanic in horror. It was sticking out of the water almost completely erect. "God almighty."  
  
The other two turned. Jack looked on in horror. Marty looked at it too then turned away.  
  
"Maybe you two should wait inside for right now." He didn't want them to see what was to happen next, but was too late.  
  
*CRACK!!!!!!!!*   
  
Rose cried out and turned away. Jack went suddenly pale, but didn't take his eyes of the scene. Rose looked back again and turned away every few seconds. Jack just stared like a zombie for several minutes as the ship made its final plunge then he finally turned away and started hyperventilating.  
  
The other rowboat looked to be coming closer. Rose pulled Jack closer to her. As Jack shifted to sit next to Rose he hit something. The doors slammed shut knocking Marty back onto the deck. Jack tried to grab the wheel and stop the car, but his foot was stuck. He twisted and turned it trying to get loose and accidentally hit the gas. The DeLorean rose above the little ship and zoomed forward.   
  
Jack still struggled to free his foot.  
  
"Oh my God! God damn it no! What do we do?! Jack?!" Rose yelled.  
  
Jack reached for the wheel again and tried to direct back towards the boat but to no avail.  
  
"Shit! Son of bitch!"  
  
Lights flashed all around and almost in an instant they crashed onto the ground and through several brushes narrowly missing a tree.   
  
They weren't sure what time or distance it had been set to. They knew Marty hadn't set it yet.   
  
They found themselves somewhere in the woods near the side of the road. When looked to check when and where they were the dashboard lights had already gone out, the gas had run out.  
  
"Shit!" Jack slammed his fist to the wheel. "Shit!"  
  
"Everything. This all happened too fast. I can't take much more of this." Rose opened the door and stepped out of the car to catch her breath. Jack followed.  
  
It was daytime and there was a long strip of road and car whizzed by them like giant flies.   
  
They pushed the car further into the woods and covered it with branches. They stayed there for several minutes just resting up against the car. No words were exchanged for a long time.  
  
Rose finally spoke. "We should find out where we are."  
  
"Let's go then." He grabbed her hand and they walked down the side of the road.  
  
They walked down approached a group of kids their age who were replacing a flat tire.  
  
The guys wore pants without suspenders, one even had his shirt open, and the girls wore tight jeans and short skirts and let their bellybuttons show. But they were dressed in styles different from what their new friends wore. Rose and Jack tried to veil their shock.   
  
"Excuse, us…" Rose started. "Hi, we're a bit lost and we we're wondering if you could tell us where we were."  
  
They looked up at them. One of the girls spoke. "Sure. You're in Hill Valley…" Rose and Jack just stood there still confused. "…California? Nice outfits by the way. Goin' to the prom or something?"  
  
They weren't sure how to answer that.  
  
"We did have someplace to go, but we kinda got side tracked." Jack answered. Rose winked at for the nice save and quick-witted equivocation.  
  
"The center of town is back that way if you need to use a phone or somethin'." The girl pointed. "Just keep going that way."  
  
"Thank you so much. Sorry to leave you so soon, but we have to be off." Said Rose.  
  
They said goodbye to the others and headed for town. The two were on the move again.  
  
Rose shook her head. "I don't think we're in 1912 anymore."  
  
"When ever the hell we are we're not going to be able to walk around dressed like this without drawing attention. We have gotta get outta here as quickly and as quietly as possible."  
  
"You're right. Let's check the DeLorean."  
  
When they got to the car they found a bag of old clothes from the previous trip in the back. They looked like they would pass for normal where they were. Rose also grabbed a wallet and pulled the cash out and handed it to Jack.  
  
"Thank God." Rose sorted threw them. She found a pair of khaki pants and a button down cotton shirt for Jack and flower print sundress for herself. They changed in the car and emerged feeling rather awkward. The clothes fit well enough, but it was still strange.  
  
Rose's dress only fell to her knees. She looked down.   
  
"I feel almost naked. Should my legs be showing too much?"  
  
"I don't think they care here."  
  
"I still feel strange though."  
  
"Don't worry. We'll get the car fixed, we'll find a way. All we need gasoline. We'll find out what happened to everybody too. We're not going to be lost here. Let's just go into town find some gas and some food and go back to Doc and Marty. We've got a pretty good idea of how to work to time machine now."  
  
"All right then. Here we go." She offered him her hand. He took it and kissed her on the cheek.  
  
"Besides, you look great." He teased.  
  
She laughed and tweaked nose. They started for town not knowing what they'd find. 


	2. Old Friends

Jack and Rose found themselves in town several minutes later. They wandered around aimlessly in the strange new world for nearly an hour. It wasn't completely unrecognizable, but yet it was very different. They sat down a park bench near a building with a broken clock tower. They were so tired they leaned up against each other fighting to stay awake.  
  
"It's probably been years by now." Rose thought aloud. "And we don't even know what happened to everybody. If we had stayed we'd probably still be there now."  
  
"I've seen crazy shit before, but tonight, uh, today rather, or…well, whatever it is, this pretty much blows everything else right out of the water. No pun intended."  
  
"It's like all those people are suffering and dying right now, but it all must have happened years ago. It must have been a big deal then, but now it's probably just an old headline. But there must have been survivors, they said you were a survivor, but something happened and you didn't make it, maybe not even the survivors are still alive, but if people we know, maybe even we are still alive here maybe…"  
  
"How do we know where to find anybody? Unless by dumb luck someone we know is residing Hill Valley right now."  
  
"But everyone else, Doc, Marty, Jennifer are all from this town."  
  
"Maybe it's before 1996, or much later."  
  
Rose looked around. "Maybe we should talk about this so loud out in public."  
  
"I hate to think with my stomach at a time like this, but maybe we should eat something soon. Get our strength back I mean and then we'll try to get home."  
  
"Wherever that is." She squeezed his hand in a sad smile. Jack looked at her for moment. He knew she must have really cared for him, but she had nothing left for her, but him now. If they could, no, when they could back home she would not be welcome in hers.  
  
Jack pulled the bills from his pocket and sifted through them. "This is definitely enough." They started down the street.  
  
It was a calm, partly cloudy spring day. It was warm and the air smelled sweet. A drastic contrast to their circumstances earlier. They walked in a daze just starting to feel their physical injuries. They had gotten over their chills, but still felt dizzy from the rush of adrenaline that was, despite the jump in years, only hours old. Jacks's wrists were bruised and swollen and Rose had somehow jammed her right pinky finger. She presumed it was from breaking down the "white star line property" door.   
  
They came to an adorable little Italian restaurant on the corner. 'De Rossi's Ristorante.'  
  
Jack looked at hopefully. The name caught him. De Rossi. "Fabrizio maybe? He was really good cook, and he said he was gonna start his own business someday. He always said he'd go to America." He grabbed Rose for a moment then released her as if in a frenzy. "He taught himself English through one lousy dictionary. Now there was a kid who was gonna make it--"  
  
Rose put her hand over his mouth. "Hold on a second. You don't think he's the only De Rossi in the world. Please, don't get worked up right now." She put her hands on his shoulders and turned him to face her. "I know you want him to have survived, I do too, but please don't get yourself upset right now. Please. Maybe it is him or maybe he lived anyway, but let's not jump to conclusions now." She brushed his hair out his face.  
  
"All right. But I'm tellin' ya, he woulda made it."  
  
They went inside and were seated in a booth. Jack examined the menu. Rose looked at the black and white photographs on the wall and gave out a sigh of relief.  
  
The fancy wooden finish jukebox in the corner played an unfamiliar song. *Penny Lane is my ears and in my eyes. There beneath the blue suburban skies and I sit and meanwhile back.*  
  
She looked back at Jack and smiled warmly.   
  
"What?"  
  
"Damn you for being right all the time." She pointed to the picture above their heads.  
  
Jack whipped around and pulled it off the wall. It was a picture of the restaurant with Fabri with toddler on knee, Helga Dahl, Jack, and another dark-haired young woman in her teens in the foreground. "Oh thank Christ."  
  
"One day you're going to be wrong and I'll be there to see it."   
  
"Nice camera work." Jack said. He pointed to the bottom where it said 'Taken by Rose, Summer 1917.'  
  
"Who's the other girl?"  
  
Jack squinted for a moment. "I'll damned. I think it's my cousin, Emily."  
  
"Oh, she's a cute kid."  
  
"She'd hardly be a little kid when this was taken, summer 1917, that would make her eighteen. She lives in Manhattan with my aunt and uncle. She'll be thirteen this July…July 1912 at least."  
  
The waiter came to the table.  
  
"Ready to order or do you need another moment?"  
  
Jack showed him the photo. "Is Fabrizio here?"  
  
"Hmmm?"  
  
Jack popped up out of the booth. "Fabri?! Fabrizio?!" Rose went after him.  
  
"Fabrizio? Helga?"  
  
The host stopped them. "Calm down kid, Pop's in the back." Jack stopped at the word and stared at the man. *Pop?* Then he ran towards the kitchen. "Hey he's busy right now."  
  
"We really need to see Fabri right now. It's an emergency. Fabrizio!"  
  
The host looked annoyed. "Tommy? Tommy, can you handle this?"  
  
No, it couldn't be. Tommy had survived too. Here's hoping. But it wasn't. A tall woman in her mid-fifties approached them.   
  
"Tommy?" Rose stared at the woman.  
  
"Tomasina De Rossi. How can I help you?"  
  
Mama De Rossi came in just seconds later. She stared at the young people aghast and cursed in Norwegian.  
  
Tommy looked over at her speechless mother. "Mama? What is it?"  
  
"Fabrizio!!!" Helga De Rossi ran into the kitchen to find her husband.  
  
Rose grabbed a newspaper off an empty table. Jack was about to follow Helga when she tugged on his arm. He tried shake her off and keep on towards the kitchen in a daze. That couldn't be Helga. She was nearly three times their age. Rose ripped him back towards her and he nearly fell into her. He underestimated her strength.  
  
She slowly moved her finger across the date. They turned to each other. They should have expected it, but this was still bound to shock them. April 4, 1968.  
  
"1968???!!!"  
  
"Mamma mia! This is pazzesco! Helga?"  
  
"Fabri? You're so…you're so…so…old."  
  
"It's happened. That night. The DeLorean. They must have been lost." His wife tried to calm him. She turned to Jack and Rose and put her hands comfortingly on their shoulders. "We were the others saved."  
  
Jack looked at her. "You speak English now…and well. You don't know how glad we are to see you…alive that is."  
  
"Please, do you know where can we find Doctor Brown?" Rose pleaded.  
  
"Jack, Rose. He doesn't know about any of us yet. How did you get here?" Fabrizio asked. So they were the ones in the boat with Clara and Jules. They knew about the time machine, but they were right, Doc wouldn't know about them until 1996.  
  
"Fabri, get the car." Helga pushed Jack and Rose out of the restaurant. "This is so dangerous." She shook her head. "What if you run into yourselves. Do you know what happen, the repercussions. We knew something like this could happen. They should destroy that damned thing…"   
  
"But it saved our lives." Jack said as he was ushered into the car.  
  
"If it hadn't been invented there would never have been a problem."   
  
Jack and Rose barely knew Helga, but they were old friends to her.   
  
The car sped off toward Doc Brown's house.  
  
When the car stopped Helga headed for the house. Fabrizio stayed in the car with Jack and Rose. The three just stared at each other in awe.  
  
Jack broke the silence. "We just came from that night, please, you have to tell us what happened. How bad was it? Who made it? Please. It's only been an hour for us. We know it's been 56 years for you, but we're still there."  
  
The old man sighed and put his hand to his heart. He didn't answer. He just looked down and shook his head. "Just an hour? Oh Dio, this shouldn't be. This should not be."  
  
Helga and a much younger Doc heading up to them.  
  
They were brought into the house. Doc was at a loss, he knew about the time machine and had known the De Rossis and the Dawsons for years and knew about Marty, but he wouldn't know that he had saved their lives for another 28 years.  
  
Nevertheless he took them in.  
  
"Great Scott! The Dawsons!? This is a disaster!"  
  
"Apparently it's not the first by a long shot." Jack said.  
  
"Where's the DeLorean?" Doc started pacing and raving.  
  
"On the side of the road in the woods. We hid it. It needs gasoline too." Rose answered.  
  
"We have to get it back here."  
  
The five of them headed for the highway and Jack and Rose led them to the hiding place.  
  
They filled it with gas and drove it through the back roads. Rose, Jack, and Doc went in the DeLorean. Fabrizio and Helga followed in their Cadillac.  
  
When they got back to the house they hid the time machine in the garage. Back in the house everyone tried to work out what was to be done. Doc ranted and raved and paced. Fabrizio and Helga scolded and worried like old couples do. Jack and Rose passed out on the couch. The others, given the wild state of affairs, forgot that the Titanic disaster was only hours old to their staggeringly younger friends. The panic of the disaster, the running, the cold, the shock of being flung into 1968. They hadn't slept or eaten in hours either.   
  
All of the horror and the confusion slipped away and they were sound asleep. Peaceful as little children after an afternoon of romping and playing. They would be safe from the world, be it the world of 1912 or the world of 1968, they would be safe from it at least for a few hours. 


	3. A Strange New World

Marty McFly rubbed the back of his head trying to regain his vision. His eyes desperately searched the deck. The DeLorean was gone. There was only a trail of smoke left behind in the air.  
  
"Aw Christ! Jesus Christ!"  
  
Clara and Jules arrived with the passengers. Doc and Jennifer ran outside. Einstein barked from within.  
  
"Oh no. What happened?" Clara cried as she climbed aboard.   
  
Marty could barely stand up. His head throbbed. "They hit something and it just went…they didn't mean to…it just went up and…it's gone."  
  
Jules helped Helga and Fabrizio inside to get warm. They couldn't comprehend anything they had seen in the past few hours. Despite the horror of Titanic's demise, the vanishing of the flying car was absolutely absurd and unexplainable.  
  
"Where are they?" Jennifer looked out towards the stars and smoke in horror.  
  
"You see, when you first disappeared after Jack vanished from the picture, we went to go check on your birth so we showed up several days before you were born. But neither you, your mother or your grandfather Dawson even existed. So we had to go back further into your family's records. And we were able to trace everything back to your great-grandmother and father. Then we also noted that the De Rossis were also missing." Doc paused for a moment. "There's more. We also recorded a television special with a man named Brock Lovett detailing his dive missions and retelling the story of Rose Dawson Calvert who apparently was Rose DeWitt Bukater. Something happened and only Rose survived so we came back to 1912 to rescue them."  
  
Marty was now on his feet. Jennifer grabbed him by the shirt. "Do you mean to tell me that you lost my teenage great-grandparents in 1968?!"  
  
"Yeah, kinda."   
  
Jennifer fainted and fell back. Luckily Jules just emerged from the cabin in enough time to catch her. They carried her back inside.  
  
Marty coaxed her awake. She was fine, but disoriented. "You alright?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Heavy stuff huh?"  
  
She nodded and even managed to laugh. He hadn't used the word 'heavy' in years.  
  
They carried her back in and set her down and tried to explain everything to Helga and Fabrizio. Unfortunately, Helga could not understand a single word they were saying and not one of them could translate for her. Fabri tried with a multitude a hand gestures, but failed to communicate anything but his own panic and bewilderment.   
  
Doc and Clara sat out on deck alone.  
  
"April 4, 1968. One horrible day to another."  
  
"Well, they must be okay somehow because if something did go wrong even after they were there for years it would have altered the future. Right?"  
  
"Yes, that is right." He got up.  
  
"Where are you going? Emmit?"  
  
"To check our plutonium supply. Most of it was on the DeLorean!"  
  
***  
  
The Brown Mansion was silent. It was nine o'clock in the morning on April 5, 1968. Rose DeWitt Bukater slowly opened her eyes and sat up. Looking around she realized the strange events of the day before had not been a dream. She groaned. Surrounded by people dying and helpless to being stranded in an incomprehensible situation.   
  
Being lost at sea was one thing. Being lost in time was another.  
  
Luckily Jack hadn't been a dream. He was there on the couch with her, sleeping under her. Lost in thought she rested her head back on his chest listening to his heartbeat. In this great and awful situation she had something so wonderful and so precious. She was thankful for him and they would pull out of this together. Even when sleeping he lit the room far better than the sunlight. She brushed his hair out his face.   
  
Then she realized there was no one else in sight. The house was empty. Something was most assuredly wrong. (Besides being blasted 56 years into the future.) Getting up slowly, making sure not to wake Jack, she wandered through the house.  
  
"Hello? Anybody here?" She looked towards Jack again. Still asleep. "Hello? Doctor Brown?"  
  
She walked back over to the sleeping Jack. On the coffee table next to them she saw a note.   
  
'Small emergency. Very sorry to leave you like this, but there have been several major issues to arise while you were sleeping. You have free use of the bathrooms and guest rooms if you prefer a more comfortable place to sleep. There has been food left out for you on the kitchen table. Your old clothes and clean ones have been left out for you too. DO NOT USE ANY APPLIANCES OR MACHINES AND DO NOT LEAVE THE HOUSE UNTIL WE RETURN. ANYTHING YOU SAY OR DO OR INTERFERE WITH CAN HAVE SERIOUS REPROCUSSIONS ON FUTURE AND/OR PAST EVENTS.'  
  
She put it down, heeding the warning. She went to the kitchen to look for the food. Roast beef sandwiches and cold milk. She hadn't eaten in ages and now she could say that with all honesty.   
  
Not thinking she inhaled her food within minutes. Remembering herself she brought the food back to Jack. She rubbed his hand softly.  
  
"Jack?" He didn't budge. She waited another moment. "Jack? Wake up." She almost didn't want to wake him he looked so peaceful and angelic. Like a baby almost.   
  
She leaned over and kissed him. He did nothing for a moment and appeared to be sound asleep and unaffected. Then he raised his eyebrows. He kissed back and felt for her shoulder. After several moments Rose pulled away. Jack opened his eyes, overwhelmingly relieved to see her face.  
  
"Morning Sleeping Beauty."  
  
"Could you do me a favor, Rose?"  
  
"What would that be?"  
  
"Do that every morning."  
  
"That can be arranged." She grabbed the plate and glass off the table. "Now eat something."   
  
In the same manner as Rose, he inhaled the meal. She just watched and laughed. "A bit hungry then?"  
  
"Just a little." He put the empty plate back down. "Ah, dammit!" The swelling on his wrists had gone down, but they were very stiff now.  
  
"Come on." Rose helped him up and led him into kitchen. She rummaged through the cabinets for a pot. "We'll soak your wrists. Just heat up some water first." She turned on the faucet in the sink.   
  
"This runs pretty smoothly."   
  
"Maybe water systems are more efficient in the 60's." She turned the knob once by accident. "Wait a minute." She wriggled her hand under the flowing water while turning it with the other. "We don't even need to heat the water. It does it by itself! See look." She pointed. "H. C. Hot and cold! It adjusts too!" She twisted the knob again.   
  
Jack removed the bandages and shoved his hand under too. "Holy shit…this is incredible." They each exchanged looks of childish delight.   
  
"Here." Rose adjusted the water to the desired temperature. "Be right back, keep your wrists under there." She left momentarily.  
  
Jack was even more surprised by Rose than he was by the magically changing water temperatures. For someone who had lived a more or less sheltered lifestyle she was either very self-sufficient or damn clever or both. He figured both.  
  
She came back in and read him the note.   
  
"So we're being held hostage in here? What happened?"  
  
She knew him for mere days, but assumed he had no intention whatsoever of following Doc's instructions. No matter how loyal, trusting, and trustworthy he may be nothing would ever keep him fenced in, at least physically.  
  
"Don't even think about it."  
  
"Think about what?"  
  
"I'm reading you like a book, Jack Dawson. We're staying here until further notice. You heard what everybody said. Horrible consequences. Serious Repercussions. We are not supposed to physically be here."  
  
"Yes we are. We're just supposed to be in our seventies."   
  
He shut off the water and stretched his wrists.  
  
"Jack you're impossible. This isn't a little fun. This won't get us into just a little bit of trouble. And this will probably be worse than being up to our elbows in horse manure kind of trouble. We don't what's happened in the last half a century. We don't know modern customs. We're lost in more ways than one. Altering time and space! I know you're too smart for that. This time it's absolutely no!"  
  
"It might not be the wisest of ideas, but I figured we should go find a library and do some research I'd like to know what happened or wasn't supposed to happen to us. Where we stand the Titanic's been under water for 56 years. We were on it and we don't even know the full details."  
  
"I don't imagine we would with only 24 hours of time after the initial disaster."  
  
"Yes, but this is going to drive us crazy if we don't find out. No matter how upsetting the facts may be. We might be here for days. I have to know. And I know you do too."  
  
"Oh really?"  
  
"I read you like a book Rose DeWitt Bukater." She sighed heavily. "Or what is it nowadays? Mrs. Dawson?"  
  
Rose ambled out of the kitchen in a daze. Jack followed. "That's right." She turned to face him. "We are married…or we will be. Helga and Fabrizio are an old couple. They've only known each other for days, well not now definitely. We've been married for many many years. We have children…grandchildren…"  
  
"Jennifer." Jack thought aloud.  
  
"Great-grandchildren."  
  
"We've known each other for mere days, but…" She him grabbed by the arms. "Remember how you said you love not knowing what will happen?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"And besides everyone warning us of the serious complications involved in knowing one's future…this is one forewarning I can really handle. It's so simple. It should be because…I…I love you!"  
  
"I love you too!" He pulled her close almost jumping in celebration.  
  
"I've known it for days. I love you like I've never loved anyone else before."  
  
"I loved you from the moment I saw you up on deck that afternoon." He kissed her and whirled her in the air.  
  
After she was back on the ground, Rose jumped back into Jack's arms knocking him back onto the couch and landing on top of him. Despite being so far away from her own time and world she never felt more at home.   
  
A few minutes later she broke apart from him. She sat up thinking.  
  
"What's the matter?"  
  
"The library!"  
  
"Library…"  
  
"You wanted to go to the library and look for information on the Titanic." Her comment didn't seem to be registering. "You were very intent on it before."  
  
"Sorry my mind was…was just somewhere else."  
  
"Something wrong?"  
  
"No, everything's perfect." He smiled.  
  
"Then what were you thinking about?"  
  
"It's not for a gentleman to say." She pushed back down giggling and got up.  
  
"Well, if you're going to have such rude thoughts about a lady I might as well take a bath to get away from you for awhile."  
  
"Would thou leave so unsatisfied?" He said trying to be theatrical.  
  
"Why yes. It's all part of my charm. Now control yourself buster, we've got work to do." With that she closed the bathroom door. "Good night, ladies, good night, sweet ladies, good night, good night!"   
  
"Hey no crossing plays!" He fell back on the couch smiling, folding his hands behind his head. All the horror could be swept away with her smile. Things were crazy and awful, but they would eventually be alright with her by his side. She was something he never wanted to let go of.   
  
After Rose finished washing up in the super convenient bathroom. Jack took his turn. While Jack was in the shower Rose went out the garage to inspect the time machine.  
  
She felt strange in her new clothes. Both the denim jeans and the blouse belled out at the ends. The sandals barely covered the tops of her feet. The jeans were tight up and down her legs and the colors on her shirt were wild: bright pink, orange and yellow.   
  
She checked the back again. There really wasn't a backseat, but a little space for miscellaneous items where they found the clothes. On the floor she found a little box with a head set attached. She thought the headset appeared rather dinky-looking. Inside the box she found a little plastic card with two holes.   
  
"The Pinheads. The Power of Love." She read the titles. She slipped it back in its spot and closed the box. She grabbed the knapsack where she found the clothes and put the box inside.   
  
Under the hood she found a brief case full of dollar bills from different years and a yellow chest marked "Pu."  
  
When came back into the house she found Jack dressed and ready to go. They left a note for Helga, Fabrizio, and Dr. Brown. They told them that they must know what happened and would be back shortly.   
  
"You look very…1968. Or at least I would have to assume." Jack wore similar pants and blue collar shirt, much thinner than the ones he was used to.  
  
They both realized that although they were safe from the tragic event of the Titanic in a world that had long since recovered from it, they were not safe from the pain and horror of that night. Last night. They were terrified of what they'd find, but they would do what they set out to do. The next trip would be the one home. Consequences be damned.   
  
They borrowed the bikes they discovered in the garage and rode off towards town to find a library.   
  
So much more awaited them then they could have ever anticipated. 


	4. Christine

The town of Hill Valley was quieter than it had been the day before. People were out and about, but there was a more sober mood than yesterday. Jack and Rose rode their bikes into the center town. The flag on the village green next to the courthouse was at half-mast.  
  
"Look at that." Jack pointed.  
  
"What do you think it's for?"  
  
"I want to say the Titanic, but I'm guessing not."  
  
"Let's keep going. We probably shouldn't check the papers. We should at least put some effort into keeping ourselves ignorant about the future."  
  
"Right."  
  
They kept riding through town half looking, half exploring. But they did manage to keep their curiosity at a distance.  
  
Soon they came upon Hill Valley High School.  
  
Rose looked it over. "It's large school. It probably has a decent library."  
  
"Let's go then." Jack dismounted the bike and left it on the lawn. Rose did the same.  
  
"Do you think we can just waltz in there? At this size it's probably a boarding school. It may be hard to get into. We may have to sneak in."  
  
"I don't think we're supposed to just waltz in anywhere Miss Serious Repercussions."  
  
"This was your idea and besides I'm not going back now." She marched up the front stairs intent on going through those doors. Jack raced to meet her there.  
  
He opened the door for her.  
  
"After you."  
  
"Why thank you."  
  
Inside the school was strange. It looked almost hospital like. Futuristic no doubt.  
  
"This must be what modern architecture is like." Whispered Rose.  
  
Jack nodded. "Yeah, we'll just keep a low profile and keep looking for the library. There should be one."  
  
Footsteps from around the corner grew louder.  
  
"Wait I think someone's coming!" Rose scrambled around looking for somewhere to hide. "In here!" She pulled Jack into the janitor's closet. They waited until the hall was silent again and stepped out.   
  
"Close one." Jack laughed.  
  
More footsteps came around the corner. Several, obviously running. Rose dashed back towards the closet again and reached for the back of Jack's shirt. She slipped on something and fell back. Her foot was stuck under box she struggled to free it, but it took her a minute. Unhurt, she regained her balance but several moments had past since the door had closed behind. The door was closed! Where was Jack?! How long had she been in there? He was nowhere in sight. Groping for the door she pushed it open heavy as it was and…no Jack. There was no one.  
  
"Jack!?…Jack!?"   
  
No Jack.  
  
She quickly scrambled up and down the hall calling for him not caring who else should appear.   
  
Someone else did appear and stopped dead in front of Rose. A girl about her age. Not very tall, a little skinny. She wasn't dressed formally for school as Rose would have expected. The girl wore a beat up tan leather jacket, faded jeans, a red bandana around her hair, and her smoked glasses hung from her blouse in the middle of her chest.  
  
She looked familiar. Long black curls and penetrating blue eyes.  
  
A future girl. Rose thought to examine her carefully, but she had very little time to.   
  
"Do you have a hall pass?" She asked. Her voice sounded on edge.  
  
"Uh…a what? Um…no."   
  
"Cool, me neither."  
  
Rose was confused. "Actually it's rather warm…"   
  
Those damn footsteps again. By now she was desperately curious to find out who they belonged to.  
  
"Shit, Strickland!" The girl pushed Rose back into the closet and shut the door. She pressed her ear to the door and listened. She waited until the footsteps subsided. "Phew, that was a close one."  
  
"Yes it was…"  
  
"You must be new."  
  
"Yes actually I am."  
  
"Are you lost?"  
  
"Yeah, I was looking for the library."  
  
"Oh I'll show you where that is. Just wait a minute. I'm Christine by the way. Christine Dawson."  
  
*Dawson?* Rose wondered. It could be a coincidence. But considering everything else it probably was not. "I'm Rose…" This person might just know who she is and she could very well be related to her. She was very curious about that fact in particular. She said the first name that came to her head. "McCoy. Rose McCoy."  
  
"Like Bones?"  
  
"Bones?"  
  
"You know 'Star Trek.'"  
  
"Oh yes." Rose had absolutely no idea what in the hell she was talking about.  
  
"My entire family watches that show. Even my grandparents love it. It's the best. Actually we're completely addicted to that and 'Get Smart.' Our sad lives seek solace in the magic glowing screen."  
  
Ah, now Rose understood: the picture show.  
  
"Me too."   
  
"I think it's safe now. Come on I'll take you to the library." Christine opened the door and let Rose and herself out. "Be as quiet as mouse and stick with me and you'll be fine." Rose followed, her thoughts on Jack. Where could he be? What happened? At every turn Christine ducked and checked around like she was sneaking through a war zone.  
  
When they finally got the library she loosened up again. They sat down at a table in the far end of the room.   
  
"So where are you from Rose?"  
  
"Pennsylvania." That wasn't a lie at least.  
  
"Cool." She said as if she were simply acknowledging something. "Whereabouts in Pennsylvania?"  
  
"Philadelphia."  
  
"Cool, I've been to Philly before. It's great city."  
  
"Yeah…" Rose would miss her home. She wasn't planning on returning to it any time soon when she got back to 1912.   
  
"What class are you supposed to be in now?"  
  
*How do I answer that one?* "I'm not scheduled to attend yet…So all that sneaking business, you seem to well practiced in it." Damn she hated how she sounded like her mother sometimes.   
  
"Yes, I am. And I'm not a slacker. I'm a rebel. I don't care what anybody says. Look at this." She dropped a report down in front of Rose. "I got this back today." 'Sally Hemmings and Thomas Jefferson by Shirley Houlihan and Christine Dawson.' "Our teacher politely, yet snidely informed us that it was a load of crap. After what happened yesterday and he's still a narrow-minded asshole. We weren't stating it as fact, but we, like good students explored all the aspects. Shirley's black, too. She's on spring break with her folks, so she hasn't seen it yet."  
  
*What happened yesterday?! Maybe that's why the flag was at half mast.* From the way Christine spoke Rose feared that by asking 'what happened?' she would look at her as if she had eight heads.  
  
Rose shook her head solemnly. "I understand. Some people just can't be swayed no matter what awful things may happen." She could certainly think of a few examples. "Listen, can you tell me where they'd take someone who didn't have a hall pass?"  
  
"Yeah, the principal's office? You were looking for a Jack when I found you, right?"  
  
"Yes." Rose gathered there was no immediate danger in any of this so she relaxed some.  
  
"Ready to risk life, limb, and an hour after school again?"  
  
"Absolutely. Research can wait." Jack would be fine. She couldn't wait to see him again.  
  
They left the library and headed for the principal's office. When they went in no one was there.   
  
"Maybe they sent him back to class."  
  
"No they couldn't have. He doesn't attend here either. Listen, I don't even go here. We just needed to--"   
  
"Someone's coming!" Christine dived under the desk and pulled Rose down with her.  
  
Strickland entered with a teacher. "Where did that kid go you say?"  
  
"He got out. I checked the records and he wasn't a student here. He was trespassing and didn't sign in as a visitor. He got into a fight with several others. That Tannen kid's gang, but he, I would assume has chosen today to play hooky." Christine scowled at the name. "They ran out of the building."  
  
*Oh God Jack!* She clenched her bag tight.  
  
"Call the authorities."  
  
The door slammed and room was silent. Rose motioned to get up, but Christine put her hand on her arm. Someone was still in the room. Strickland. He walked towards the cabinet moving things about a bit and then sat down at his desk. Rose and Christine huddled together moved as far back as they could.   
  
Strickland sat back and relaxed. The girls cringed and held their breath, not moving a muscle. Then he leaned down to open a draw. He shuffled around until he found what he was looking for. Most likely something he confiscated from a student. Whatever it was he was playing with it on his desk.   
  
The girls heard something drop on the ground next to them. A pen. Strickland moved back slowly in his wheelie chair. It made an awful squeak. He reached down for the pen not quite touching Rose's left leg. It slipped from his hand barely a second after he retrieved it. Christine bit her lip and twisted her face. Rose closed her eyes, her face expressionless, her heart beating more and more rapidly. When it landed again it was touching her foot. Strickland picked it up this time without fail.  
  
He placed the pen back on his desk and got up to leave. Rose was about to exhale, but Christine quickly and silently lunged forward to cup her mouth and waited several seconds after the door closed.  
  
They emerged from the cramped little space. "Scary stuff. That was *really* close."  
Christine took in a big breath, as did Rose. "Let's get outta here. And we'll find Jack."  
  
"They probably cornered him at Lou's Diner. That's procedure. Lou doesn't rag any of us delinquents. We'll check there first."  
  
"Alright then. Let's go now."  
  
"By the way, is Jack your boyfriend?" She asked as she was opening the window.  
  
"Yes is he." Rose found she was extremely proud to admit that fact.  
  
"Funny." Christine swung her right leg out over the windowsill.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Nothin.' Let's move before Strickland comes back. Boyfriends, always have to watch those bastards or they just get lost."  
  
Rose laughed and followed her new friend out the window, through the parking lot, ducking behind cars, and out of the campus and into town. 


	5. Gary

Jack ripped through town leaving the high school far behind. *Who the hell are these guys?*   
  
After he was stopped by the bald man in hall, he was taken to an office and told to stay put. He was to sit in a chair and wait while being babysat by another man. A scene all too familiar.  
  
Only this time his rescuer was not Rose. In fact there were several more of them now and they demanded money. They locked the door soon after they entered.   
  
Jack thought this was complete horseshit and was not going to take it for a second.  
  
He told them to get lost in several words. But it was not until he was hoisted up by the shirt collar that he decided on more aggressive tactics.  
  
He kicked one of his assailants in the groin and punched another in the face, leaving the others to trip over them as he dove through the window and closed on one of their hands.  
  
Now he was being chased. Many times he believed he was clear when they showed up right behind him. He lost them around the corner again and ran into a diner.  
  
There were more kids in this place than in the school. Weren't they supposed to be in school? The music in here was louder than in De Rossi's.   
  
*We all live in a yellow submarine, yellow submarine, yellow submarine, we all live…*   
  
It sounded familiar, like the 'Penny Lane' guys. He wondered if every restaurant and home had a turntable now. Strangely enough, when he looked around he couldn't locate any turntable.  
  
Weary, he sat down at the counter and no one bothered him for a few minutes. He contemplated how to get all the way to the high school, sneak back in and find Rose, without running into anyone unfriendly. At least she was safe in the closet…but knowing her she would have gone out searching for him.  
  
"Hey kid, you gonna order something?"  
  
"What?"  
  
Are you gonna order something or not?"  
  
"Uh, yeah…coffee black." Jack whipped out a crisp 1960's dollar bill and slapped it on the counter. He got less change back than he expected. *Even the value of the dollar is sideways.*  
  
He drank some of his coffee and put it back down.   
He ran his hands through his hair as did the person directly to his left, but he didn't notice him. His mind was focused on finding Rose.  
  
Then someone burst through the entrance, both doors swinging.  
  
"Hey Dawson!" Jack and the kid next turned around simultaneously.  
  
The meat-headed kid spoke again. "Hey are you deaf Dawson? I'm talking to you. Didn't I tell you never to come in here?"  
  
The other Dawson spoke. "Didn't I tell you I don't listen to guys with names like Butch?"  
  
"Say that again?"  
  
He reiterated carefully and purposefully. "I don't listen to guys with names like Bitch, opps, what did I say? I meant Butch, but you know they sound so similar."  
  
Now everyone in the diner was silent and staring at Butch and this smart mouthed Dawson kid, especially Jack.  
  
"What did you say? It didn't think it was very funny."  
  
"But you know what is funny? Watching George McFly beat the living hell out of your brother. Now that's funny."   
  
"That's it! You think you're so God damn smart don't you! All right Gare, let's see how tough you are now. Monday after school. The parking lot. You'll be there."  
  
"Oh bite me Tannen."  
  
"I kick your ass one way or another!"  
  
Another one spoke. One of Tannen's gang. "Hey Butch it's that kid we found back at the school!" He pointed out Jack. "This dork actually tried to sneak *into* school!"  
  
Butch and his gang laughed and he motioned for them leave with him. "I'll see you around too, dork. And Dawson, say hi to your sister for me."  
  
Tannen and his thugs were gone after that. A girl passed by them as she left. "Great going, Gary. That was awesome."  
  
"Thanks."  
  
Jack still stared at Gary in awe. "You're Gary Dawson."  
  
"Yeah." He went back to his cereal, but then noticed Jack was still staring at him intensely. "Are you okay?"  
  
"Oh yeah…I…I'm fine." Jack did notice the resemblance between them, but he thought he looked more like his Uncle Joe when he was young. This guy was his grandson. His grandson. And he couldn't be much more than a few years younger than him, if not older.   
  
"Don't worry about Tannen and those other assholes. They're just morons; they can't do anything. They're lucky if they can spell their own names."   
  
"You did a good job of standing up to those guys."  
  
"Well, I shouldn't have waited so long to. Are you new town?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Cool. You got a name by the way?"  
  
*Cool?* "Jack…" He couldn't use his real name. He said the first name that came to his head. "Taft." *The President? Oh well.*   
  
"Well I guess you know I'm Gary. I gotta go, but I'll see you around."  
  
"Yeah I'll see ya later." *Much later.*  
  
Gary got up to leave. Jack was about to turn back to his coffee when he saw Rose.  
  
"Rose!"  
  
"Jack!"  
  
He ran to her nearly tripping over himself. "You're alright!"  
  
"Of course I am and you are too!"  
  
Christine was with Rose too, Gary turned to her. "Cutting class has now become very romantic I see."  
  
"Hey we were hiding under Strickland's desk while he was in the room. We almost got caught right in his office. And aren't you supposed to be home sick?"  
  
"Aren't you supposed to be in class?"  
  
"You say nothing I say nothing."  
  
"As usual."  
  
Christine turned to Jack and Rose and cleared her throat. "This is my brother Gary. Twin unfortunately."  
  
"Up yours, Chris. Jack this my sister Christine. Chris this Jack Taft."  
  
Rose raised an eyebrow at Jack. *The President?* He nodded and shrugged.  
  
"Gary this Rose McCoy." Jack was relieved that Rose hadn't used her real name too. "And I think you too already know each other." She indicated Jack and Rose.  
  
"Like Bones?" Gary asked.  
  
"Wait we left the bikes up at the school! Doc should be home soon!" Rose remembered everything.  
  
"What about the library?"  
  
"Look at the time it's 11:30! We didn't expect to be out that long!"  
  
Christine interrupted. "Yeah what were you looking for anyway?"  
  
Rose looked at Jack and then turned back to Christine. "We were doing research on the…the Titanic."  
  
"General?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"We'll get that for you? You have to go Doc Brown's?"  
  
"Yes, we're staying there."  
  
"Oh crap, I'd drive you but I have pick up something from home. And I don't have the car." Christine sneered at her brother.  
  
"I've got the car. I'll take you."  
  
"Thanks." Said Jack.  
  
"No problem."  
  
Christine left and Gary drove Jack and Rose home and picked up the bikes.  
  
He dropped them off in the driveway. Good. Doc hadn't gotten home yet.  
  
"Where are you guys from?"  
  
Rose answered before Jack could say anything. "I'm from Philadelphia and Jack here's from Wisconsin."  
  
"Then how do you two know each other?"  
  
"We came here together…we were in London before." Jack said.  
  
"London. That's a long way from Hill Valley. I've never been, but I hear it's cool city."  
There was that 'cool' again. "Hey it's funny." Gary laughed. "My grandparents are Jack and Rose too."  
  
"Really." Jack sighed. He looked over at Rose as they got out of the car. She seemed to be expecting it to.  
  
"Even weirder. You guys have to research the Titanic disaster. They met on it! Along with the people who own De Rossi's Ristorante. They all met there together. Except my grandpa knew Mr. De Rossi for a few years before that. They were traveling together. Then they met my grandma and Mrs. De Rossi, who didn't even speak English, or so I'm told. But anyway they all survived and stuck together after that. Pretty cool huh?"  
  
He never mentioned anything about Rose's situation. Did they never tell him?  
  
"But none of them really talk about it much. I can see why though." He started the ignition.  
  
Now this was killing them.  
  
"We'll see you later Gary." Rose waved to him as he pulled.  
  
"Yeah, bye." Jack grabbed Rose hand headed back for the house.  
  
"Bye guys! Catch you around!" Gary called to them.  
  
They got back into the house weary and dazed. They sat back on couch memorized.  
  
Jack sighed heavily. "Jesus Christ." 


	6. The Cold Hard Facts

April 5, 1968 12:00 PM   
  
"We met our grandchildren. They're our age." Rose stated with odd lack of emotion.   
  
"Uh huh."   
  
"Christine looks almost exactly like your cousin."   
  
"Yes she does. We're in a lot of trouble aren't we?"   
  
"One might assume so. Doc's isn't going to be happy."   
  
"We haven't screwed any up yet I guess."   
  
"Yet."   
  
"Well if we weren't going to get home Christine and Gary wouldn't exist."   
  
Just then the telephone rang. After several rings Jack finally picked it up. "Hello?"   
  
"Jack?"   
  
"Yeah." Rose moved in closer so she could hear.   
  
"It's Doc. Sorry I was out trying to get a hold of more Plutonium. We have just barely enough to get you home and a certain event occurred yesterday which might have adverse effects if either of you obtain knowledge of it."   
  
"What? Do they sell Plutonium in drugstores now?"   
  
"No, I had to go to more drastic measures, but no worry, no worry. I have it now. Wait there. Don't leave the house and we'll get you home by tomorrow. I just have to make a few repairs and figure out a few new functions, but you'll be alright." He hung up.   
  
"We're going home." Rose smiled.   
  
***   
  
Meanwhile back in 1912…   
  
"If they were able to get back they would've been here by now." Said Jules.   
  
"But if they weren't able to get back Jen wouldn't be here." Argued his little brother. "…Maybe they got back but they're lost."   
  
"They've been gone for ten minutes. Where could they be?" The boys' mother was pleading with their father in the next cabin. "They should have been back immediately."   
  
"We should wait just a little longer. Give them another ten minutes and then we'll do something, but just another ten minutes."   
  
***   
  
"Should we tell him we left?"   
  
"No." Rose answered him.   
  
"That was quick."   
  
"Well if we're going home very soon we'll be fine and he won't find out. Nothing bad happened yet. Like you said."   
  
"Except for being chased by gang of thugs that make life hell for our grandkids and nearly being caught by some schoolmaster, knowing that something awful and apparently newsworthy happened yesterday and we can't know about and either we find out and do something stupid or we spend our whole lives wondering what happened on April 4, 1968…I could go on."   
  
"I never thought you'd be one to worry like that."   
  
"I've been in over my head most of my life, but this the only time I haven't enjoyed it."   
  
"Sorry to ruin your fun."   
  
"I never said I was bothered because I wasn't having fun. We just have a big problem on our hands."   
  
"The problem is being solved."   
  
"At this very moment we are not home. The problem has not been solved yet. We were supposed get off together when the ship docked, but that didn't happen and I won't be at ease until we're back in 1912."   
  
"It was your idea to leave the house."   
  
"I'm sorry okay, this just isn't registering with me."   
  
The doorbell rang. Rose stormed off towards door to go answer it. It was Christine. She had two little children with her. The girl was about two and the boy a few years older.   
  
"We got you a couple books with some general information in them. It's not much, but it was the best we could do."   
  
"Oh thank you." Rose said pretending to forget her fight with Jack. "The fact that you did anything is remarkable." She took the books from her granddaughter's filled hands.   
  
"No problem. Just helping out the new kids. Couldn't kill us and I like you guys. Ow!" The little toddler in her arms had latched on to her hair. "Linda sweetie please let go of Chrissie's hair. That hurts very much." Linda giggled and squealed, but complied with Christine's order. "Baby-sitting."   
  
"Would you like to come in?"   
  
"Sure. Thanks. Is Doc home?"   
  
"No not at the moment."   
  
"Hey Jack!" She came in and put the toddler down on the couch and freed her hand from the little boy. Little Linda looked up at Jack with curiosity. Jack smiled at her and she smiled back.   
  
"Chwis I have to use the toilet." The little boy tugged at Christine's pants.   
  
"Hold on a minute. I gotta take Dave to the bathroom." Christine and Dave disappeared into the bathroom.   
  
Jack watched with anticipation Rose as she paced and forth with the books, not opening them. She eventually set them down and sat next to Linda.   
  
"Ouch!" Linda yanked down Rose's hair and was examining it. Rose giggled with little girl as she tried to free her locks forgetting everything else for a minute.   
  
"Careful. She's got thing about hair." Christine had emerged from the bathroom.   
  
"I've noticed."   
  
Christine picked Linda up again and signaled to Dave. "Sorry we've got to go. I've gotta have these two back home by twelve thirty and I can't be late. Mrs. McFly's got the third kid coming and she's having the craziest mood swings. My sister, Nancy's having a baby too, she's even worse."   
  
"Mommy's gone nuts." Dave commented.   
  
Christine just shook her head. "I'll see you guys around." The goofy threesome skipped out moments later.   
  
"McFly?" Jack turned to Rose.   
  
"Marty. Sister?"   
  
"Jennifer."   
  
"Shit." Rose sighed.   
  
"You said shit."   
  
"I know."   
  
"I've never heard you say that before."   
  
"Do you want to check the books now?"   
  
"No."   
  
"Let's do it."   
  
"Right." Jack picked up the first book, one on sunken ships. He sifted through the pages until he found the one on Titanic.   
  
They read the first few paragraphs silently and stopped.   
  
"The most famous shipwreck of all." Rose whispered after a moment.   
  
"Fifteen hundred people. One thousand five hundred."   
  
"Not enough lifeboats."   
  
"The Californian saw the flares and got the distress signal, but didn't respond."   
  
"Mothers, fathers, children."   
  
"And we knew them."   
  
"It was yesterday and now it's just some text entry. Some little historical note." She barely got the last words out and her voice cracked awkwardly.   
  
Jack closed the book shut and pushed it off the table taking the other book and an empty glass with it. He drew Rose closer to him and held her tighter and tighter until they were crushing each other, faces pressed into each others shoulders with loud, painful wails.   
  
The absurdity of their unique situation had distanced them from reality. It only took few simple facts on paper to bring it all rushing back. The result was agonizing and unbearable.


	7. Great Scott!

When Doc came home later that day he found out Jack and Rose had been in town, met their descendents, gotten mixed up with a Tannen, and discovered the truth about the Titanic. But at this point he dared not scold them even though they hadn't listened to his very specific orders; they were too distressed. They would have found out in due course anyway.  
  
And what made him think they would listen anyway? He known them as a fun, but stubborn old couple and they were just as obstinate as adolescents.  
  
He let the two skulk around the house for day and let them do what they pleased-which wasn't much. They didn't read, listen to the radio, or watch the television, nothing; they barely even ate or talked.  
  
One other thought plagued his mind as well. What was *he* doing back in 1912? He knew he would build other time machines (a nineteenth century train and now a sailboat.) And people thought converting a DeLorean was weird. Jack and Rose had said they were on the boat. What the hell was wrong with it? Were they stuck?  
  
***  
  
April 6, 1968 11:00 AM  
  
Jack didn't get a very good sleep the night before, and the morning wasn't looking very promising either. He did get in about four solid hours and he would've slept longer if he hadn't been shaken out of bed.  
  
"Jack!" said the voice ripping through the room.  
  
"Uh?" was his only response. His raised his eyebrow over his one open eye and saw not the body that was now on top of his, but a newspaper. He finally focused in on the word 'Memphis.'  
  
"Jack look at this!"  
  
"Good morning."  
  
"Look dammit!" Rose climbed off of him and sat down next to him. "Read it." She handed him the paper.  
  
Jack was puzzled by her excitement considering what they went through the day before.  
  
"What's this?"  
  
"Yesterday's newspaper. I found out what the 'big event' was." He looked at her and she nodded insistently. "This man is.was like no other I've ever known of."  
  
He looked at the headline. 'Martin Luther King Jr. Assassinated.'  
  
"Who's that?"  
  
"Read it! Read it!" He got through the first paragraph when Rose ripped the paper out of his hands. "He was brilliant! Just read his speeches." She flipped a few pages back. "See they printed some of them here."  
  
"Whoa, hold on a minute. You read the article already, give me chance." He held out his hand for the paper and she gave it up.  
  
Rose hopped off the bed. "After you read that come downstairs. Helga and Fabrizio came over to help with breakfast."  
  
"Haven't you eaten yet? How long have you been up?"  
  
"Two hours, and yes, but I had Doc's cooking," she grimaced, "needless to say I'm still hungry." She gave a big kiss on the cheek and skipped out of the room.  
  
He started to read the article. Like Rose, he became more enthusiastic about the subject as he read on. Jack came from a time of racial tension and had lived in a world that wholeheartedly believed in white supremacy. Jack never bought any of it. Ethnic background didn't make a person greater or lesser, it's who *you* are. And anybody who thought that it did was the lesser, lower person.  
  
He was amazed that Rose had liked King's ideas so much. She had probably been taught that because she was white and that she came from powerful family that she was the cream of the crop, but then again she seemed to despise those kind of people too.  
  
But it was true that no one of their generation had come along that was that dedicated to racial and economic justice and that was that successful and charismatic.  
  
Now racial equality was a big issue, and rightfully so he thought. *Well, now they have a martryr* he thought.  
  
And Rose was right, his speeches were brilliant. One especially. They only printed a few, they all from a few years earlier.  
  
It made him angry too. A man that believed in and promoted nonviolent demonstrations was killed by violence. Someone like that comes along and some degenerate has to kill them. This one's name was James Earl Ray.  
  
The words he spoke in his last address were eerily prophetic: "Well, I don't know what will happen now, but it really doesn't matter with me now. Because I have been to the mountaintop.I may not get to the promised land with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as people will."  
  
***  
  
Breakfast that morning was interesting to say the least. Before Jack came down Rose was berating Doc and the De Rossi's with questions like a small child. And after he came down Jack started to do the same thing, but then fell silent.  
  
It was the best damn pancake platter he'd had in years.no it was the *first* pancake platter he'd had in years. The last one he had was in Santa Monica when he was fifteen.  
  
It was still hard to enjoy though, not because of the Titanic sinking, not because of Martin Luther King dying, but because he could not take his eyes off his best friend.  
  
It was good old Fabri, emphasis on the old. Same funny accent, same posture, facial expressions, same kind of humor.but it was so strange.  
  
He'd gone through most of puberty with this guy.and not so long ago, especially for Jack. The only thing he didn't miss about home was the nickname "Babyface," and another nickname applying to story about his ice fishing accident, it named a certain part of the body and what happens to it when gets very cold. Jack was one for details, but he opted not to share that part of the tale with Rose. But he thought of telling her about his famous nickname, if he couldn't scare her out of jumping, he'd try to make her laugh. Luckily for Jack, she decided to climb back over sooner.  
  
But Fabrizio, it was just too bizarre. He was only older than Jack by five months. *This is too strange.* He reassured himself that he'd get back home soon and he would see his friend again just as he had left him.  
  
Jack was brought out of his thoughts by Doc.  
  
"So we're all ready to send you two back to 1912!" Jack dropped his fork. "I'll go with you so there won't be any trouble this time. I've got everything under control."  
  
"Jack we're going home!"  
  
"Get yourselves ready after breakfast and don't take anything out of the time machine, we don't want to leave anything that could cause problems behind."  
  
***  
  
"What the hell happened here?" said Rose.  
  
The garage had been completely ransacked, equipment overturned, windows broken, the DeLorean opened.  
  
"Great Scott! Check the car make sure nothing's missing!" shouted Doc.  
  
Rose began to dig through the seats and Doc opened up the hood to check there. Jack started to clean up, searching for any clues.  
  
"What was in here?" Rose called from within car.  
  
"A portable cassette player with a cassette, a baseball almanac for the years 1903 to 1993," he winced, why had they left that in there? They should have known better, especially Marty. It said 'Happy Birthday Verne' on the inside flap. Who was Verne? "an empty can of Pepsi, a newspaper from the year 2001, a pair of mittens, and the bag of old clothes."  
  
"Doc what's a cassette?" Rose picked up the Pepsi and it dripped, she dropped it immediately. "Is this Pepsi chemical lethal?" She asked looking at the strange container.  
  
"No it's a soft drink, like Coca-Cola. And a cassette is like a vinyl record in that it plays music, it's in a plastic box which would be the cassette player and has head phones attached."  
  
"Oh phew."  
  
"They're all there?"  
  
I think, hold on a minute.okay here's the cassette player with everything and the Pepsi can.the bag and the mittens.oh here's the newspaper and the.nope that's it."  
  
"The almanac is missing?!"  
  
"I would guess so."  
  
Jack spoke up. "Does this mean anything? I found it by the door." He handed a business card to Doc.  
  
'Tannen Auto Detailing.'  
  
"Biff."  
  
"What's that?" asked Jack.  
  
"Trouble. A hell of a lot of trouble."  
  
A knock came on the door.  
  
"It's your grandson! Cover the DeLorean!"  
  
They draped the cover over the DeLorean and opened the door.  
  
"Hey Gary." Said Jack.  
  
"Hey guys, hey Doc. Listen, Rose, Jack, me and Christine and some of our friends are having kind of an Anti-Pep Rally get together tonight.that is if Tannen doesn't crash it. Wanna come?"  
  
Jack looked over at Doc and he nodded. "Uh sure.count us in."  
  
"Oh cool, we're meeting outside the courthouse, unless of course you want to go to actual pep rally?"  
  
"Oh no, we're not the uh pep rally types." Said Jack having no clue what a pep rally was.  
  
"Alright then see you there. Well, I gotta go."  
  
"Alright we'll meet you by the courthouse." Rose smiled.  
  
"Later guys hope you like Hill Valley. But I wouldn't wear those clothes."  
  
He left them with that.  
  
"I like this dress!" huffed Rose.  
  
"Let's just hope Tannen crashes that party." Said Doc.  
  
"Why we would we want that to happen?" asked Jack.  
  
"Because Butch Tannen, is Biff Tannen's younger brother."  
  
"What interesting names." Rose mused.  
  
"He's no better than Butch. He once got his hands on an almanac before and used it to make himself a millionaire, altered the future.he's seen the DeLorean before, if he got any reports from his brother about you two he'll know, after a series of incidents back in 1955 he got a little suspicious. It must be him! This a disaster!"  
  
"I'll try to get it myself, but if I can't I'll give you his address just in case, we have to get that almanac back no matter what."  
  
"So we'll steal it back from him." Said Jack nonchalantly.  
  
"You don't know Biff Tannen. This isn't going to be easy."  
  
"Lovely," sighed Rose, "just lovely."  
  
"Well, I like a challenge." Jack said half-heartedly.  
  
"You want to go back to you're time?"  
  
"Yes." they said.  
  
"Then we're going to put our every waking hour into getting that almanac." 


	8. The AntiPep Rally

After being debriefed on what pep rallies were, learning some new slang, and listening to the tales of the previous adventures with the DeLorean Jack and Rose arrived at the courthouse around eight o'clock. Christine and Gary were there along with three of their friends, a tall, Mediterranean looking kid named Ricky De Rossi, and a blonde freshman named Joey Baines, and the Dawson's twelve year cousin Lizzy Calvert.  
  
"Sorry we couldn't get much a crowd." Gary shrugged.  
  
"Wanna get high man?" Joey asked Gary.  
  
"No. My little cousin's here anyway. Jesus Christ man! And with you even the God damn cat burglar could get caught."  
  
"Dude, you're so gonna end up in Juvie." Ricky teased Joey.  
  
"You'll have to excuse little freshman here. He's not really a bad kid. He just strays a bit and *always* gets caught."  
  
"Shut up Chris. And don't call me freshman!" sneered the freshman.  
  
"Okay Freshman." said Lizzy.  
  
"Now you've got the sixth grader calling me freshman!"  
  
Everyone else just laughed.  
  
"Well," said Gary, "it's either that or Jailbird Joey."  
  
"Let's go already." sighed Christine.  
  
"And where are we going?" asked Rose.  
  
"Peabody's lot. It's abandoned now. Crazy old man used to breed pine trees. Went all the way crazy after he claimed a UFO drove through his barn."  
  
***  
  
Peabody's Lot  
  
The group walked through the entrance passed a lone pine tree.  
  
"Alright kids," said Gary, "we got marshmallows, hotdogs, the works. Who wants what? Joe, you brought the matches right?"  
  
"What matches?"  
  
"Dammit Jailbird!" Ricky huffed.  
  
"Sorry."  
  
"Now what?" Lizzy raised an eyebrow.  
  
"Guess we could just eat the marshmallows." Joey sighed.  
  
"You guess." sneered Christine.  
  
"That's what happens when hang out with freshmen." Lizzy commented.  
  
"SIXTH-GRAD-ER." Joey enunciated for her.  
  
"Well, comparatively, Lizzy's a lot cooler than you are." Gary smiled.  
  
"But everybody knows I'm the coolest." said a new voice. Butch Tannen.  
  
Rose and Jack exchanged glances. *Perfect.*  
  
"Screw off Tannen." Gary snapped, "Nobody wants you here."  
  
"So why aren't you rejects at the pep rally?"  
  
"Why aren't you, asshole?" Ricky retorted.  
  
"It's my job to drive around and make sure everybody goes."  
  
"Make sure everybody goes? It's not required, Neanderthal." said Christine.  
  
"I've got a message for your brother." Jack declared.  
  
Everyone turned to him. Neither Jack or Rose had opened their mouths since the courthouse.  
  
"Did you say something to me new kid?" Tannen seemed almost offended.  
  
"I said I've got a message for your brother." Jack glowered. He had a low tolerance for bullies.  
  
"What message?"  
  
"Tell him we know Calvin Klein and we know what he has."  
  
"Huh?" said Tannen.  
  
"We know Calvin Klein. Yeah we do."  
  
"Are you deaf?" Rose elaborated. "He said we know Calvin Klein. And we know what he stole from Dr. Brown. Please tell Biff that if it is not returned immediately there will be serious consequences." Butch laughed. "Do you want me to write it down darlin'?"  
  
A perfect impression of Margaret Brown, Jack thought. He wondered if she ever considered acting as a career.  
  
Everyone looked at the two of the shock. After a silence Gary spoke.  
  
"Piss off Tannen or we'll have Ricky put a pine tree through your skull."  
  
"Fine, but I'll be back in an hour. I better not see you when I get back...oh, wait. I forgot I've got a *from* message Biff." They all raised their eyebrows. "Baines, he says `say hi to your sister for me.'"  
  
"Shoo Tannen!" Christine yelled.  
  
"Call me Dawson! You know you want me!" he winked at Christine.  
  
That was enough to get rid of him. He stomped off.  
  
"Was he talking to you or me?" Gary asked Christine. They all broke out in laughter.  
  
"Where was his usually band of goons?" asked Joey.  
  
"Who knows." said Ricky. "And how do you guys know his brother?" he looked at Jack and Rose.  
  
"We don't really, but we know he broke into Doc Brown's house this morning." said Rose.  
  
"We've got to follow him." Jack whispered to Rose. "if--"  
  
"I know where he lives!" Joey interrupted. He'd overheard them. "He still lives at home with his grandma."  
  
"Loser." Christine laughed.  
  
"Actually all those guys he used to hang with too." Gary added, "what were they're names?"  
  
"Skinhead, 3-D, and Match," said Joey, "the four of them still try and bother my sister and brother-in-law. But they don't do much good. My brother-in-law's a pretty cool guy now. Apparently he was some huge dork in high school. But they're all dorks."  
  
"Jesus, don't any of these guys have normal names." Jack asked.  
  
"Hey, why don't we go bust Tannen?" asked Christine. "Now that our anti-pep rally's essentially ruined."  
  
"Hey, I wouldn't say ruined." Joey defended.  
  
"Listen guys, I don't know if that's such a good idea." Rose said uneasily, "I mean all of us just going in there."  
  
"We're professionals McCoy, don't worry." Gary smiled.  
  
Rose looked at Jack. He shrugged. There wasn't much else they could do. Besides, how much could a little help hurt?  
  
***  
  
The seven of them snuck through town toward the Tannen house.  
  
"That was really cool how you guys stood up to Butch like that." Lizzy said to Rose. "You didn't just tell him off, Gare and Chris do it all the time, but you guys really scared him. I don't know how you did it but you did."  
  
"Well, thanks."  
  
"You guys are the coolest. Can I come live with you?" 


	9. The Tannens' House

A car pulled into the Tannens' driveway.  
  
The group hid under the bushes outside.  
  
"Who's that?" Rose squinted with the garage light in her eyes. The figure walked inside and was met by the yelling of an ancient woman.  
  
"Biff." Christine whispered. Not a moment later a body came right up behind them. Christine whipped around pulling it to ground.  
  
"Chris!" screeched the voice muffled under Christine's hand.  
  
"Sshh!" Christine hissed. "…Hey Shirl. How was your trip?"  
  
Shirley Houlihan moved her friend's hand. "Better than being smashed into a sidewalk."  
  
"Sorry."  
  
"Jesus, Chris." Gary shook his head. "Hey Shirley."  
  
"I was being alert. I react."  
  
"What the hell are you guys doing sneaking around here anyway?" asked Shirley.  
  
"Biff Tannen raided Doc Brown's garage today. He stole something we're getting it back."  
  
"Stole what?"  
  
"Umm…Jack? Rose? …Oh, this is Jack Taft and Rose McCoy. They're new in town. This my friend Shirley."  
  
"Hi," said Jack and Rose, "it's a book…but it's REALLY important." Jack finished.  
  
"And you plan on masquerading in there and getting it back?"  
  
"Oh no, we have a plan." Gary assured her.  
  
"We do?" asked the others.  
  
Joey laughed.  
  
"Pipe down, Stoner." Gary snapped.  
  
"I'm just gonna go check out the car." Jack got up toward the garage.  
  
"You can't just waltz in there!" Ricky pleaded.  
  
"Listen, Fab—" Jack cut himself off. "…This is what we came here for. I'm going in." Jack crept off toward the garage. He'd been in much worse before. Biff Tannen didn't scare him in the least.  
  
Okay, he was in. He snuck around looking for anything. He searched through the car, even picked the trunk open. No book. Nothing.  
  
Jack crawled through the open doorway in the back of the garage and peered into every window of the back of the house. In the very last window he came to he saw Biff. He looked much like his younger brother. Same build, same air of meat-headedness.  
  
He quickly ducked under the window again, peering in every few seconds. After about two minutes Biff pulled out a book. Jack only saw one word on the cover…* Baseball.*  
  
The word itself had never looked so beautiful. But now how was he going to steal it back? Or get back to his friends without getting caught.  
  
***  
  
"He's been in there a while." said Gary.  
  
"Baines, go back there and check on Jack." Christine volunteered Joey.  
  
"No!"  
  
"Be a man, Jailbird." Ricky hit him on the shoulder.  
  
"Fine, fine! Be that way. I'll go, but if I get caught…" Joey leered at the others.  
  
"*If?*" Christine asked a little too loud.  
  
Someone came up suddenly from around the house and put his hand on Christine's shoulder.  
  
"WAH!" she screeched. Everyone one else followed her.  
  
It was Jack.  
  
"Sorry." he shrugged. "Umm…the book's in there…Biff's got it."  
  
"Well, step one's complete I guess." Gary shrugged.  
  
"Well, how badly do you need this book anyway?" Christine raised an eyebrow. Something about this was beginning to look fishy. All this for one lousy book? And even though she liked them something was definitely up with this Jack and Rose pair.  
  
*Oh, your existence only depends on it.* Jack thought at his granddaughter's bitter comment.  
  
"Uh, guys I'd like to get out of here before someone comes out." Gary warned, already moving down the block. The others followed.  
  
The door from the Tannen place swung open. It was the old woman. She saw nothing as usual and went back inside. Unfortunately, Butch pulled into the driveway seconds later.  
  
"HEY!" he called to the group. He could just see them disappearing off. He must have heard them before.  
  
"I'll handle this." Christine started back toward the Tannen's.  
  
"You don't *need* to go." Ricky grabbed her arm.  
  
"I can have that horny Neanderthal wrapped around my little finger. I'll get him off our tails."  
  
"You won't *do* anything, will you?" Ricky still held a grip on her arm. "'Cause if he makes a move I'll kill him."  
  
"If he makes a move I'll kick his ass." Chris corrected. She kissed him on the mouth and walked toward Butch.  
  
"Ew." Joey commented.  
  
"Oh grow up." said Lizzy.  
  
"I don't care if she's athletic or about her little feminist manifesto. The fact is he's BIGGER than her. He could snap her head off if he wanted to." Ricky shook his head and followed Christine.  
  
"It may be by only two minutes, but I'm her older brother and it's my job to watch her rebellious, hippie-wannabe behind and protect her." Gary marched off with him.  
  
"I can kick anybody's ass." Shirley followed.  
  
"I took out that weird Adolf kid when I was living in Paris. I think I'll go too." Jack decided.  
  
"I broke somebody's nose the other night." Rose raised her hand.  
  
"When did break anybody's nose?" Jack asked.  
  
"I'll tell you later…Joey stay here and watch Lizzy." ordered Rose.  
  
"No problem." Joey saluted.  
  
"Hey!" Lizzy wanted to go too…or at least not be babysat by Joey.  
  
***  
  
Three blocks later the eight of them were still shouting "Run run!"  
  
"Jesus," Gary panted, looking at Rose, "…you *broke his nose!*"  
  
"What the hell was *that*?!" Shirley squeaked.  
  
"You were all talking about 'ass kicking'! That's what I did!" Rose defended. *'Ass kicking…that sounds so funny.*  
  
"Yeah, but nobody's actually done it before!" said Ricky. "We didn't actually expect to get him. We would try, but…"  
  
"I know you're new here, but *no one*, especially not a girl, talks back to Butch Tannen or punches him in the nose." said Gary.  
  
*No girl ditches Cal Hockley either * thought Rose.  
  
"So how do you feel now?" Christine asked, thoroughly impressed.  
  
Rose turned to Jack and smiled. "Groovy."  
  
***  
  
Later that night after all the excitement everybody went home. Gary Dawson tossed his keys on coffee table and knocked over a picture. He paused making sure he didn't wake his parents. The only thing he did hear was Christine moving around in the bathroom louder than humanly possible. If they woke up it would be her fault.  
  
He picked up the picture and looked it over. It was of his grandparents' wedding. He hadn't seen it in years. His mom must have been moving things around.  
  
Gary turned on the lamp to see it better. He stared at it for a while, trying to make sense of it.  
  
No. It couldn't be. It was impossible. Shear coincidence. But who else could they be? 


	10. Gary Finds Out

Gary raced across town to the Brown Mansion early the next morning. He didn't know why, but he took every picture of his grandparents he could find. They were now in his backpack. His parents always said he carried the classic Dawson intuition and he knew something was up.  
  
He thought of every other possibility that could be. They could be other relatives of his that bore a strong resemblance to them. But they were a couple. They couldn't be related to each other.at least he hoped not.  
  
Minutes later he was in the front yard. He was about to dash for the front door, but he instead turned and ran for the garage. He heard voices, but instead of knocking leaned against the walls, listening in.  
  
"I'll send you two home and destroy the book myself."  
  
"I don't care anymore. Let's go home then," Rose sighed, "these clothes are starting to make me sick." Gary peered in. What was she wearing? Something pale lavender or blue. H couldn't quite see. It was elegant, but damaged. Antique looking. Jack looked pretty antique himself; only he was dressed in more modest clothes. Wait, they were wearing those clothes yesterday when he came. Strange.  
  
There was fumbling around and he couldn't hear everything they were saying. Then he could hear better.  
  
".And the flux capacitor." Doc continued.  
  
"Which is what makes time travel possible." Jack and Rose finished for him.  
  
*Time travel?* Gary raised an eyebrow. He didn't believe he was hearing this. He was always a bit of a sci-fi geek, but he was eighteen now. But he wanted to believe it; it was an absurd yet perfect answer to his questions.  
  
"Well, at least this time we actually have enough fuel to get you back. Tonight we'll take this sucker down to old Peabody's Lot and send you back to the past!"  
  
"Well, Doc, it's been a helluva a trip." Jack smiled.  
  
"Destination 1912." Rose put on a pair of sunglasses and cracked a big grin. Jack started laughing.  
  
"Unfortunately for you, Rose, the only people who wear those back good old 1912 are the blind."  
  
"If I'm spending the rest of my life with you I must be."  
  
He gave her a little pinch and they giggled.  
  
"I'll take you back inside for lunch and celebrate! Come on Edison!" Doc called to the sleeping beagle.  
  
The dog trotted behind the three people excited at the word 'lunch.' Doc pushed open the garage door ceremoniously and slammed into Gary's curious head.  
  
"Arg!" Gary fell over and looked up at the people he was now sure were his grandparents.  
  
"Gary!" Doc shouted. "How long have you been here?"  
  
"Long enough." He clutched his head. Rose helped up. "Thanks, Nana." Rose slowly stepped back.  
  
"Listen, Gary," Doc started, "I know this seems strange-"  
  
Gary took a hard look at his *grandparents* again and fainted. It was the sixth time he had fainted in his life. He hated to admit his embarrassing quirk. But he couldn't help it. Gary was a fainter. And so would his soon-to-be-born niece.  
  
***  
  
"Did I faint?" Gary cringed opening his eyes to a familiar scene. The last time he fainted was at his grandparents' house two years ago when he found out he didn't make the basketball team-but his sister did.  
  
"Yes you did, but you'll be okay." His grandmother smiled; hair red now instead of white. Same smile, same everything with less age. "How are you feeling?" She dabbed his head with a wet washcloth.  
  
"I still don't believe it."  
  
"Neither do I."  
  
"Rose, how old are you?"  
  
"Seventeen. Eighteen in October 1912."  
  
Gary shook his head. She was even younger than he was. Only by about six months, but still it was too weird.  
  
"So that makes Pop." Gary started counting trying to remember exactly how old his grandfather was, a little older than his grandmother, but not by much. "I can never remember exactly, how old is he?"  
  
*His parents died when he was fifteen, but that was a few years ago. But how much is a few? Oh my God, I DON'T know how old he is!*  
  
"I'll be right back." Rose dashed out of the room.  
  
*She doesn't know how old he is?* Gary thought.  
  
"Jack! Jack!"  
  
Jack was downstairs with Doc fiddling with a 1980's camcorder that had been left there some years ago and a tape he had found hidden within the Delorean. The camera was now hooked up to the television.  
  
"Rose," he said gesturing to the television, "it's a miniature picture show."  
  
"Really?"  
  
"A television. I'll tell you all about it later, but for now were gonna watch this and see what it is." He handed her a flat black box.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"A VHS tape." answered Doc.  
  
"You can record your own movies on it." Jack announced with pride as if he had invented it himself.  
  
"Film?" Rose asked.  
  
"No, not film.*tape*." Jack said.  
  
"Well, I know it's a tape, but you *film* something with it."  
  
"No you *tape* it."  
  
Rose shook her head seeing if she was going to understand it would take her a while. "Listen, Jack," she started.  
  
"Yes, Rose?"  
  
She spoke slowly and deliberately. "How old are you exactly?"  
  
That stopped him. Now he knew she was seventeen. She mentioned it somewhere. But Did he ever tell her how old *he* was?  
  
"Uh, I'm nineteen."  
  
"Alright," Rose nodded, "you're nineteen.that is good to know.nineteen.Gary's up. I have to go talk to him now." She ran back upstairs.  
  
Doc gave him a sideways look. ".I guess we didn't get to that yet." Jack shrugged sheepishly.  
  
***  
  
Rose came back downstairs with Gary.  
  
"It's working!" Jack gestured to the TV.  
  
"What's that?" Gary pointed to the tape.  
  
"You'll see." answered Doc. *We'll all see.* He thought thinking about the last thing he saw on one of these. "Okay, let's pop her in!"  
  
The four of them sat down and began to watch the tape. It was obviously recorded from television in 1996.  
  
It started out with some guy named Brock Lovett who was exploring the Titanic wreck. Then it went to something about the discovery of one of her passenger's who was thought to be dead. It went on to recount the story of Rose Dawson Calvert a.k.a Rose DeWitt Bukater. Other specifics following her Titanic experience were yet undisclosed for she died not long after coming out with her story.  
  
One hour later.  
  
"This has been a History Channel Special Presentation." Doc shut off the tape.  
  
"Wow, Lizzy at 40, she doesn't look half-bad," said Gary thinking about the interview footage of his adult cousin, "and you," he turned to Rose, "101, that's pretty good.but then again I don't exist and Jack's dead."  
  
"That was supposed to be us in that water." Jack said distantly.  
  
"And I know the Calverts! What happened to Mrs. C?!" Gary realized suddenly.  
  
"I think *I'm* going to faint now." Rose sighed.  
  
"Just think," Jack breathed, "we're going home tonight, we're going home tonight."  
  
***  
  
Gary eventually left and promised to come back soon. He wondered if he tell anyone. His parents would never believe him even though his father was the son of these people. His grandparents-as he knew them already knew and they were on vacation in New York. Lizzy knew-in some alternate universe, but she was only twelve now. Ricky's grandparents had been apart of it, but he would never believe him. His older sister, Nancy? She wouldn't believe him either.and didn't want to upset a pregnant woman. But he had to tell Chris.  
  
Another thought crossed his mind that Cal guy looked a lot like some one he knew in town, one of Biff's old goons. He worked at the car wash now.  
  
*Whatever.*  
  
Gary ran back toward the high school and into the gym where the Hill Valley Girl's Varsity Basketball Team was playing.  
  
He saw Shirley in the background and tried to get her attention, but then he saw his sister. Better do what he came here to do. He sighed and gave up Shirley for the time being.  
  
"Christine!"  
  
Startled, Christine missed the basket.  
  
"Jesus, what happened to you?" She skipped over, black ponytail swinging behind her.  
  
"A lot.I need to talk to you."  
  
"We're in the middle of practice."  
  
"It's important. It's about Jack and Rose. There's something you should know about them." P "I knew it! Their satanic cult *does* worship me!"  
  
"That's not funny." He hated it when she was these kinds of moods. Not there was anything wrong with joking around, but she always did it at the most frustrating times. "Are you free after practice?"  
  
"No."  
  
"We'll you are now."  
  
"No, I'm not I'm busy. Don't tell me what to do!"  
  
"Goddammit, Chris, this is important!"  
  
"Fine," she sighed sensing his urgency, but still pretending not to care, "but I'll have to cut it short. I have to meet Shirl."  
  
"Bring her along then. Meet me at home."  
  
"Alright! And you calm down, I don't want you fainting all over the place."  
  
Gary grumbled and walked away. Hopefully, she would believe him. But now Shirley was coming too. She couldn't know and what if he tried to tell Christine with her there? She'd think he was insane.  
  
Life just didn't get any better. 


	11. Christine Finds Out

Note: There's a minor racial slur in this chapter. It's not meant to be malicious, not by the author or even the character using it. It's my own group even, so it's not like I'm trying to insult anyone.  
  
Things got even worse for Gary Dawson. He, Doc, Jack, and Rose had waited for Christine at his house. Unfortunately, Christine had brought more than just Shirley; they came home with Joey and Ricky, too. Lizzy was also there; she was using the pool. It was the same group from last night all in his living room. Gary thought he was going to faint again. He tried to tell Chris privately, but after ten minutes the conversation had geared off topic and away from Gary himself.  
  
"And some high school in the next county got all up and arms when a black guy and white girl tried to go to a dance together." Christine was updating Jack and Rose.  
  
"If that's the case," said Shirley, "who in the hell am I supposed to take to senior prom? There's only five other black kids in this school. Three are girls, Don Blake has a girlfriend and Louis Russell is socially defective and wears decade-old pomade-and globs of it, too."  
  
"Well, if the schools got a problem with it you'll either have to change you're sexual orientation or make Louis Russell's day." Christine smiled.  
  
"Ick, Louis," Shirley shuddered, "then I'll switch sides if that's the case." Everyone else laughed, especially Rose-her mother told her once that there were no such things as homosexuals. "Actually, I'll just go with a normal date-because you know what they say." She looked at Christine as she went to the record player and slipped on Chris's HAiR soundtrack.  
  
"What do they say?" Christine asked, though she already knew what she was doing. The music started and Shirley and Christine began to dance. Shirley sang along-with Chris and Lizzy as her back up, standing in line behind like Diana Ross and the Supremes.  
  
White boys are so pretty  
  
Skin as smooth as milk  
  
White boy are so pre-e-etty  
  
Hair like Chinese silk  
  
Rose jumped up to dance with the girls and tried to keep up with the modern dance moves and the words. Shirley pulled Joey up from his chair and started dancing with him. The three back up singers rolled back their shoulders in sync with the music on the word 'shoulder'.  
  
I'll tell ya that ya white boys give me goose bumps  
  
White boys give me the chill-hills  
  
When they touch my sho-o-oulder  
  
That's the touch that kills  
  
Now everyone was up and dancing even Doc. Shirley was now dancing in between Jack and Ricky and singing to them. Pretending to flirt with them.  
  
Well, my momma calls 'em lilies  
  
But I call 'em Piccadillies  
  
My daddy told me stay away  
  
But I said come on out and play! Heeeyyy! White boys are so groovy!  
  
White boys are so tough!  
  
Every time that they're near-ear-ear me  
  
I just can't get enough  
  
Everyone was now dancing in a circle around the furniture.  
  
Oooh-ooooh! White boys are so pretty!  
  
White boys are so sweet  
  
White boys drive me cra-yay-azy  
  
Drive me indiscreet Whoa-oo! White boys are so sexy  
  
Legs so long and lean  
  
I love those sprayed-on trou-ou-ousers  
  
Love the love machine Yeah-eah! My brother calls 'em rubble  
  
That's my kind of trouble  
  
My daddy told me "no no no no!"  
  
But I say "White boys go!"  
  
She went up to Gary and starting dancing with him and when the line 'run my fingers' came up the moved her hand through his hair. Gary tried not breathe, otherwise he would have been panting.  
  
Heeeeyyy! White boys are so lovely!  
  
Beautiful as girls!  
  
I love to run my fi-i-ingers  
  
And toes through all their curls Give me a tall  
  
A lean  
  
A sexy  
  
A sweet  
  
A pretty  
  
A juicy  
  
White boy! "Black boys!" sang Lizzy and Chris. "White boys!" Shirley answered. "Black boys!" they shouted with Rose joining them. "White boys!" "Mixed mediaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" all the girls sang together and the song ended. Everyone jumped up and down and clapped. Nothing like a musical number, is there?  
  
"I think I see a future for us," Shirley turned to Lizzy, Chris, and Rose, "Shirley Houlihan and the Crackers.maybe not today.but someday." Everyone else burst out into laughter.  
  
It took another two hours to get everyone out of there. Gary sat Christine down and pulled out all of his grandparents' old photos. He felt nauseous; she'd never believe him. He calmed himself and decided to handle the situation delicately.  
  
"Alright Chris, sit down and shut up till I finish." He took her by the shoulders and plopped her down on the couch. "What would you say if I told you time travel was possible?" He spread out his hands for effect. ".You can talk now."  
  
"Well, if you told me time travel was possible." she paused. Gary waited anxiously for her reply. "I'd ignore you like usual."  
  
"Come on, work with me!"  
  
"What? And believe your childish crap?"  
  
"Admit it. Jack and Rose look *exactly* like the old pictures of Nana and Pop. They even have the same patterns of speech. Now, you tell who else they could be."  
  
"I don't believe I'm hearing this."  
  
"Then I'll have to show the tape."  
  
"The tape?" Chris laughed, expecting him to use masking tape as some sort of grand evidence. After much protest he got her to come with him to Doc's house and showed her the tape. Doc sat and watched it again still utterly fascinated, Jack and Rose went upstairs; it bothered them too much, Gary sat on the couch pensively with his sister's feet behind his head as she munched on popcorn.  
  
One hour later  
  
"This has been a History Channel Special Presentation."  
  
"*History* channel? Bite my ass!" Christine laughed.  
  
"You already said that three times. It lost its impact 40 minutes ago." Gary snapped.  
  
"By the way," Christine sighed casually, "I brought you a present." She tossed the baseball almanac on the coffee table. The others stared in shock.  
  
"How in the hell did you do that?" Gary asked.  
  
"I'm a freaking genius.it was in the backseat of Biff Tannen's car. He was in Lou's and I pinched like I was picking up the God damn newspaper.what?"  
  
Everyone still stared.  
  
"Don't get any ideas, but you'd make an excellent criminal." Jack laughed. "'Don't get ideas'? Thanks Dad." Christine mocked.  
  
"That's GRAND-dad to you."  
  
"Actually, we call you Pop.Pop." Everyone but Gary laughed who was mad at Christine (as usual). "It's so weird, you guys are older than Dad and our aunts."  
  
"Yes." Rose thought aloud, thinking that these were the children of her not yet conceived son.  
  
"So now you believe?" Doc asked excitedly, eyes bulging in his usual manner.  
  
"Yep," Christine smiled, "if you really aren't telling the truth and you were able to pull off making that little film than you're much smarter than me and could trick me anyway." Twenty minutes later everyone had left. Christine had date to keep with Ricky, Gary had to go to work at the supermarket, Doc, Jack, and Rose had to go get things ready for Jack and Rose's safe departure.  
  
As soon as the third generation Dawsons left, Doc had to run a couple of errands leaving Jack and Rose at their own disposal. At first they decided maybe to go upstairs and spend some 'quality time' together, but then figured Doc would be home soon and they really didn't want to be caught in the act. It did occur to them then that they'd only made love the one time in the Renault, but they decided to wait until they had more time to avoid any potential embarrassment. Under normal circumstances, once the idea of sex had been presented, it would be very hard to resist, but the future Dawsons had discovered something even better than sex-television.  
  
The two teens sat in front of the television set for two hours, eyes blanks and mouth half-open-not realizing that Doc was so busy it would have given them enough time make love undisturbed.  
  
"Wow," said Jack admiringly, "Spock is so cool."  
  
"Cool!" Rose laughed at their new novelty word.  
  
"Groovy!"  
  
"Sexy!"  
  
"Hey, look at this!" Jack pulled off his shoe and put it to his ear. "Who am I? Hello?" he answered his shoe.  
  
"Maxwell Smart!"  
  
"That's correct, 99!"  
  
While they were both doubled over on the floor laughing the doorbell rang. They scrambled to the floor to answer it, figuring it was Doc.  
  
Rose opened the door to reveal a heavily pregnant woman.  
  
"Oh, hi there," she smiled, "you must be Doc's relatives. He said he needed some things so I brought them over." She was holding a cardboard box.  
  
"Here, let me get that for you." Jack took the box from her.  
  
"Oh, thank you. Look at this stuff, such a character he is."  
  
"Well, we all appreciate it." Jack smiled. "Oh, I'm Jack Taft and this is my girlfriend, Rose McCoy."  
  
"I'm Lorraine. Lorraine McFly. My brother Joey's told me so much about you- " She winced and grabbed her middle.  
  
"Are you okay, Mrs. McFly?" Rose asked, having a feeling she knew what might be wrong.  
  
"Ah." she winced again. "I'm fine-ine. Oo, ow."  
  
Jack and Rose led in her inside to where she could sit down and call someone. Her husband, George wasn't home and the lines to the cab service and her doctor were both busy.  
  
"From what I know these things take a real long time. We should be able to get through to somebody before it gets really bad." Jack whispered trying to reassure Rose. Then Mrs. McFly let out another painful scream.  
  
"Listen," she breathed, "it's coming," Rose and Jack paled, "not now, but soon. Please get me to a car. I'll tell you how to get the hospital. NOW!" She wailed again as another contraction hit. Without thinking Jack grabbed Doc's keys and pulled the car around, taking down a few bushes. He had only been behind the wheel once-and that was in a Model T and for about three minutes.  
  
Rose helped Mrs. McFly into the backseat and they were off. Poor Mrs. McFly thought they were all right. Jack knew as Rose wondered that he had no idea what he was doing. 


	12. Childbirth

"Aaahhh!" Mrs. McFly screamed. Whether it was from the labor or the fact that Jack took down a mailbox only she knows.  
  
"Sorry!" Jack yelled.  
  
"Arg!" This was an actual contraction. Lorraine squeezed Rose's hand so tight that she yelped with her. Rose tried to scoot over to move away from where Mrs. McFly's water had broken, but she held to her spot. "Take a left!" She called to Jack.  
  
Jack nearly hit another car as he went through a red light. Lorraine was too far into to labor to take too much notice except to yell at him everyone once and a while.  
  
"Whoops! Sorry!"  
  
The cars zipped and buzzed past. They could be hit at any second. Jack was in intense concentration. He started to lose grip on the wheel from his sweating hands. Yet, he had still worked himself into a Zen-like state, trying to learn how to drive a '65 mustang while on major roads.  
  
Rose's thoughts were more to the woman slowly breaking her hand. *If we don't get there in time.we'll have to deliver this baby ourselves.*  
  
"Jack, hurry!" she shouted.  
  
"I'm going as fast as I can!" he yelled. Then he wondered if he was. How fast could this puppy go? Was there some sort of legal limit? He sped up.  
  
*Whoosh!*  
  
They narrowly missed being crushed between two other cars as Jack tried to weave through them. Lorraine and Rose screamed from the backseat.  
  
"Sorry!"  
  
Then they hit it. Traffic.  
  
That's when Jack decided *screw this.*  
  
He began to weave in and out of traffic. *There's a space right in between those two trucks.I can make it.* He turned into the next lane and tried to squeeze in between. He drove in between and then-boom, boom! Clanking metal. The car jostled to one side as the women in the back we're screaming.  
  
"Sorry!" he groaned. "Come on people! Great-grandson-in-law, coming through!" He beeped the horn.  
  
Mrs. McFly looked confused, but in too much pain to really care. Rose leaned forward and pinched him hard in the arm  
  
"Ow! What did you do that for?"  
  
"Shut up!" she hissed and gave another more intense "SHUT UP!"  
  
"Right! Right!" Mrs. Fly screeched. At first he thought she was agreeing with Rose on him shutting up, *Oh, turn right!*  
  
Jack jerked the wheel and saw the hospital up the road and pushed his hand into the horn not taking it off. He swung the car into the hospital entrance-the wrong way.  
  
Another car stopped dead in front of them, tires screeching, horn beeping.  
  
"BABY!" Jack yelled at the other car angrily. Jack tried to turn the car from the tight spot and lead the car slightly up hill through the parking lot. It was giving him quite a bit of grief.  
  
"WHAT GEAR ARE YOU IN?" Mrs. McFly called.  
  
"GEAR?!"  
  
Jack pulled in front of the building entrance and slammed awkwardly on the brake. Rose called for help as hospital staff ran out to meet them.  
  
They helped Mrs. McFly into a wheelchair; her husband was there, too. Someone had relayed a message about his wife screaming in Doc Brown's car.  
  
"Hi, honey. Are you okay?" She punched him.  
  
Grabbing his nose as he scrambled to his feet, following the wheelchair inside. Jack and Rose leaned against the car, wiping the sweat off their brows. After a minute, Rose spoke, still catching her breath.  
  
"Sorry I pinched you." "That's alright. Things were pretty intense.she'll be fine now."  
  
"But on Titanic, we never yelled at each other like that, I'd deem that a much worse situation."  
  
"There is something more intense than sinking ships.childbirth," he cracked a weak smile, the future bearer of his children smiled back, "but what I don't understand is what she meant by gear.like I ever drove before."  
  
*** Four hours later  
  
Jack and Rose decided to make themselves useful and hang out in hospital café while the McFly child was being born. They had done their job; it was time to relax.  
  
George McFly came down to tell them about the baby.  
  
"I can't thank you two enough for bringing Lorraine over here. If you want you can come up and see him in the window."  
  
He led the two teens up to look at his newborn son. He pointed. The baby was right in front, sleeping peacefully.  
  
"Hello, Marty." Rose smiled. 


	13. War

Brown Mansion  
  
Doc's mind reeled. Marty had arrived. It was going to be a long seventeen- year wait to finally talk to him about events that happened thirteen years ago. It was a lot to think about, but unfortunately he had other headaches today.  
  
Gary came in. Doc immediately jumped up. He'd sent the young Dawsons out with Christine to keep them occupied after weird day delivering Mrs. McFly to hospital and Doc himself tried to prepare things for their departure.  
  
"Is everyone else back yet?" Doc jumped up.  
  
"No, Chris took 'em to a movie." Gary sighed. He'd been in a weird mood that day.nothing too strange, just.sad.  
  
"A movie?!"  
  
"Yeah, a movie."  
  
"A MOVIE?!"  
  
"Yes! What's so criminal?"  
  
"What kind of movie was it? Information in a film could potentially expose them to knowledge of the future!"  
  
"Christine's movie picks aren't generally filled with useful information."  
  
"Just-" Christine busted in and cut Doc off. P "Hey kids!" Doc grabbed her by the arms. "Whoa! Hey, I don't have any drugs. Calm down. In fact, look at what excellent youth I am, all day with my grandparents."  
  
"What kind of movie did you take your grandparents to? Did it have any information pertaining to the past 56 years?!"  
  
".are you talking *serious* information.?  
  
"What do you mean?" Doc asked warily. Christine didn't answer, but Jack and Rose did when they paraded in a moment later-singing.  
  
"Springtime for Hitler and Germany! Winter for Poland and France! Deutschland is happy and gay! We're marching to a faster pace! Look out.here comes the master race! Springtime for Hitler and Germany! Winter for Poland and France! Springtime for Hitler and Germany! Come on Germans, go into your dance!"  
  
Doc screamed. Gary smacked his head.  
  
"You should see it. It's great.you've never seen anything like it." Christine couldn't look Doc or Gary in the eye.  
  
"I'm sure those two to haven't either." Doc gestured to Rose and Jack.  
  
"No, we haven't!" Rose said enthusiastically.  
  
"You know," said Jack, "I knew a kid named Adolf back in Paris.now there was a sore, sour son of a bitch if I ever met one. He was an artist, too.wasn't bad either, but he couldn't draw people, they'd always come out funny."  
  
"I'm sure there's a Freudian explanation for that."  
  
"Anyway, what did he do?"  
  
Doc, Gary, and Christine stared blankly at Jack.  
  
"Pop, you did NOT know Adolf Hitler." Christine said in the hopes of proving him wrong.  
  
"Yes I did, lived in a garret near mine. Got into a fistfight with him. Got him pretty good."  
  
"And why pray tell didn't you kill him?!" Christine demanded. Jack took a step back.  
  
"Okay, we can't talk about this. There's no use, we just can't.ever again.any of you." Gary declared.  
  
There was a long, very uncomfortable silence for about four minutes.  
  
"And what's been so wrong with you today?" Christine suddenly demanded of her brother, trying, in her way at least, to break the silence.  
  
"Remember Bobby Pickett.kid on the soccer team.graduated last year?"  
  
"Yeah." Christine nodded.  
  
"He was killed.Khe Sanh."  
  
"Wow," Christine sat down, "Bobby Pickett's dead."  
  
Jack and Rose exchanged quizzical looks. Khe Sanh? What was that? Doc looked at them and then the twins. They were obviously bent on talking about poor Bobby Pickett, but their grandparents couldn't hear it. To Doc, it was like obscenities in front of the children.  
  
"It's not fair to guys like Bobby," sighed Gary. Doc moved his hand in front of his neck giving him the signal to stop talking. Gary continued, "I was talking to him once. He was thinking of going to community college, but he just wasn't good at school. You know, if he just went to school, he'd be alive right now. I'm never going to over there, I'm a good student so I'll be in college and I'm the only son of an only son. It's not fair. If he did comeback people call would call him a baby killer. What makes me so much more deserving than guys like Bobby Pickett?"  
  
"Nothing. If you feel so bad go sign up for the war." Christine challenged him. Gary sat down; no, he couldn't do that.  
  
Doc sat flopped down on the couch. Beautiful. Just beautiful. He was really sorry about young Bobby, but where was that boy's head? His grandparents were right there!  
  
Doc was ready to pull Gary aside and give him one of his fanatical lectures. *Your sister showed them a movie about World War II.sort of.not really, but it was about a musical about Hitler! You openly talked about Bobby Pickett down in Vietnam now! Why don't you tell them about the next war! Tell Lt. Jack about his hysterical blindness that he had for two months! I'm sure he'd love to hear that! Gary, are you out of your mind?!* Alright, good speech: calm, logical, and concise.well, concise at least. That's all he needed to give Gary what he need to SHUT UP.  
  
He got and walked over to Gary. "We need to have a verbal exchange."  
  
".Hey, there's a '46 Ford parked outside." Christine interrupted. Doc ran to the window.and screamed.  
  
"WHAT?!" everyone shouted.  
  
Gary leaned out the window. "Uh.guys."  
  
"Oh no, Tannens and friends." Christine sneered.  
  
"Hey." Rose pointed. Jack furrowed his brow.  
  
"It's not him." said the other three in unison and they looked back to the window.  
  
"Anybody wanna go investigate?" Christine asked looking for volunteers. "Jesus, they have the frigging almanac.well *had*," Christine smiled thinking of her accomplishment in retrieving the almanac, "what else do they want?"  
  
"Answers." Gary said.  
  
"That's deep, Gare." said his sister.  
  
"This smells like trouble." Jack though aloud.  
  
"Thank you for that brilliant observation, Captain Obvious."  
  
Rose was on the verge of telling Christine not to talk to her grandfather like that, but she held her tongue for fear of sounding like her mother.  
  
Doc pulled out a pair of binoculars from his jacket. Yup, both Tannens.all their friends.  
  
"Great Scott!"  
  
The Tannens and their respective goons went into the garage.  
  
"Great Scott! The time machine!"  
  
"Hey, that guy looks like-" Rose began again.or so she tried.  
  
"We've got to get them out of here and make sure they don't get their hands on anything!" Doc proclaimed.  
  
"Right-O, Doc, you're the brains. What's the plan?"  
  
"I'm formulating one at this moment.just give me a moment or so." Doc began frantically pacing.  
  
Jack knew this was time for some serious messy business. Fabri would be perfect for this; they'd gotten into all sorts of stuff like this before.he thought that for a moment, but no. He'd seen him a few times over the past few days in 1968. Things were a little weird even if they were amusingly novel, Jack being 56 years younger and all. Better leave Fabrizio home for this one.  
  
"I think I've got a plan! I've got a plan!" Doc jumped. He ran into his study to get something motioning everyone to come with him.  
  
"Well, boys, I reckon this is it-nuclear combat toe to toe with the Roosskies." Christine smiled and followed the others. 


	14. The Big Spill

*Run down to garage, run fast, get there before they do damage, but look casual, don't be obvious, go casual, Dawson.* Gary coaxed himself.  
  
Doc watched the figure heading down toward the garage. *This better work.* It was the most brilliant plan he had ever conjured. It was more brilliant than the lightening and the clock tower thirteen years ago. This would get the Tannen posse away and help the Dawsons escape unnoticed.  
  
Gary got to the garage and had his hand on the door. *Put your hand on the door. Turn the knob.whoops and don't forget to breathe.* Gary opened the door.  
  
"Hi, guys." He squeaked. Tannen's gang just stared him down. "So.steal anything good?" *Steal anything good? I'm done.* He just stood up to and humiliated Tannen's little brother days earlier now is voice was going through puberty again at the site of the gang.  
  
"Hi, Dawson." Smiled Match, the one that looked exactly like Cal.  
  
".What are you doing?" Butch sneered.  
  
"Stopping you from doing something that would get arrested and possibly taint your integrity.?" By now Gary was sure the plan was dead. He'd already messed up pretty badly. But now his biggest worry was avoiding a severe ass-kicking.okay, that was his second biggest worry-next to getting Nan and Pop back to 1912. But it was still a pretty serious issue at the moment.  
  
Biff came closer.  
  
"Look guys, let's not be so hasty.I mean c'mon.what am I to you?" He grinned idiotically.  
  
"Well, he's bait now." A new voice laughed.  
  
*She's an idiot. Damn crazy idiot.*  
  
"You never called." Smiled Butch. The prize he'd been eying since freshmen year just waltzed in. Great, Butch was here, too.  
  
"Christine, you're an idiot!"  
  
"You screwed up the momentous plan, so I'm instituting a new one."  
  
"Whoop-di-do! Let's make things a little worse!" Gary shouted, waving his arms. For once he saying whatever came to his mind.  
  
"Worse? Our posse is bigger than theirs!" Tannen's gang stood by curious, by no the slightest bit intimidated.  
  
Gary guessed right as he glanced outside. The posse consisted of Shirley, Ricky, Jack, Rose, and Lizzy. Doc, too, he thought. But he was probably in mourning for his brilliant, foolproof plan.or raving in the streets.or both.  
  
"Ooo, I'm sure everybody's really scared now!" Gary pretended to shake and quiver.  
  
"Hey, Dawson.why don't you make like a bread truck and get your ass out of here?"  
  
Everyone stared and pondered Biff's statement for a moment. It didn't sound quite right. Even Butch rolled his eyes.  
  
"Are we missing some sort of weird slang?" Jack scratched his head.  
  
"It's 'haul buns!' 'Make like a bread truck and haul buns,' you dumb bastard!"  
  
Biff tried hard to comprehend it-it was a no-hoper.  
  
"Shut up!" he growled.  
  
By this time Christine had managed to sneak herself behind the wheel of the DeLorean.  
  
"Less talk. More action." She whispered to herself and smiled as she turned to ignition.  
  
"What the." Shirley dropped her jaw at the sound of the engine. Christine had done it again. Her family seemed so calm and sensible. She wondered who she got it from.  
  
With little regard for whoever might have been behind her, Christine put the car in reverse.  
  
"Whoa, shit!" Ricky jumped to the side. Christine bit her lip in embarrassment. *Free time machine, don't kill boyfriend,* she thought to herself.  
  
Each member of Christine and Gary's "posse" scurried, dashed, fell, or hurled themselves to the back of the garage. The car stopped, tires screeching. Christine was about to bust out at full speed.  
  
"Crazy bitch!" Butch, cried as he, his brother and his three thugs crawled to safety under the workbench.  
  
Butch may have been right. But she was still winning-and he wasn't. The DeLorean smashed through the wooden garage door and out into Doc's driveway.  
  
Just then Doc came out of the house again, bursting with more brilliance.  
  
"I have an idea, maybe instead of just-" He'd entered a cloud of dirt. He regained his vision just in time to see the time machine speeding away down the road.and his damaged garage. ".great scott."  
  
"I didn't do it!" Lizzy shouted, running through the yard with the teenagers not far behind her.  
  
"Christine," Gary breathed, "took a few desperate measures."  
  
"There goes your plan, huh?" Ricky shrugged. Shirley and Rose hit him in the arm. He always knew the right thing to say.  
  
The Tannens and friends hopped into the car after Christine.  
  
"Shit, shit, shit!" Gary whirled around and ran to his car. Not this time, not his sister.  
  
Shirley, Lizzy, and Ricky followed close behind. Jack and Rose turned to chase after them, but Doc grabbed their arms.  
  
"Stay here. You're the commodity we're supposed to be handling."  
  
"Wait.?" Jack began to ask.  
  
Doc was already down by the garage.  
  
"THIS IS A DISASTER!!!!!!!!!!!" Then he let out a high-pitched scream. Jack and Rose winced.  
  
"Hey, man." Joey Baines strolled up casually, hands in his pockets and whistling.  
  
"You're a little late." said Rose.  
  
"Where were you, Jailbird?" Jack sighed.  
  
"Oh, I was just ripping off-I was at the store, uh, running errands for my mom."  
  
"Right." Rose nodded.  
  
"Hey, each to his own.and what are you two doing? All the excitement on its way to the center of town."  
  
"The center of town?" Jack lit up.  
  
"Do I hear an echo? Come on, my car's over there, I'll take you."  
  
"I thought you get your license at *sixteen* in California.you're fifteen." Rose was suspicious.  
  
"What do you care? You'll get in the car with Jack. Lorraine told me the whole story." Joey reminded them of their little driving escapade with his sister and his new nephew the day before.  
  
Doc was already pulling out in his car. "Opps, bad mistake," Joey smiled, "he just left the worse people to leave unwatched to their own devices." He jingled his keys.or whosever keys they used to be.  
  
***  
  
Christine had successfully lost the Tannens and kept the time machine under 88 miles per hour. Now all she had to do was wait.wait to trade off with her grandparents.wait to put the pedal to the metal again when her foes showed up. But Christine didn't wait. Christine parked the DeLorean behind the "Welcome to Hill Valley" sign and headed for the center of town.  
  
***  
  
Before Jack, Rose, and Joey left the Brown Mansion, Jack took the liberty of looting the garage of the newspaper he had found days earlier in the time machine.and one other particularly neat item.  
  
Joey drove was at the wheel, driving mostly on the curb or on the wrong side of the road. Rose and Jack sat in the back reading the paper: the November 18, 2001 issue.  
  
"'Nine year-old Londoner Justin Pitt Breaks Arm at Paddington Station, Tried Jump to Platform Nine and Three-Quarters'." Jack read the headline softly.  
  
"Who is the Harry Potter guy anyway?"  
  
"Better question: who's *this* guy?" Jack pointed to a rather unpleasant looking man.  
  
"Donald Rumsfeld?"  
  
"I guess.why did you take the board?"  
  
"The bright pink compliments my eyes." Jack grinned.  
  
"Whatever satisfies you."  
  
"Okay, kids. Thank you for flying Baines International."  
  
The three of them hopped out in front of Lou's to find some sort of public meeting going on in front of the clock tower.  
  
"He says the 'f-word' a lot." Jack observed the speaker at the podium.  
  
Tannen's car whipped past them, as did Gary's. Gary lost a little control and nearly clipped a few protesters.  
  
"Sorry!" called Shirley.  
  
"Self-righteous, hippie bastards!" Gary growled and shook his fist. He was as anti-war as anybody, but the guy making a speech had yelled at him for five minutes because he was eating a hamburger.plus they were in his way.  
  
"I'm not sure if like the new Angry Gary." Lizzy whispered to Ricky.  
  
As Gary's car emptied, so did the Tannens'. Biff hunted for any sighting of the flying car he hated so much-today was not going to be another Calvin Klein, he was determined to see to that. Butch looked around for either Dawson twin, he planned to have his separate way with each of them.  
  
"Gary!" Doc ran across the square through a mob of angry protesters.  
  
"Doc!"  
  
"Where are my grandparents?" Gary asked suspiciously.  
  
"Back at the house, back at house." Doc waved, feeling slightly more relieved.  
  
"You sure?" Gary asked while staring at the car Joey Baines had ripped off.  
  
"Absolutely, my boy."  
  
"That's interesting," Gary said, "because I'd swear that's Jack figuring how to use that neon floating board thing he got from the time machine." Doc's jaw dropped. Gary slowing pointed his finger; Doc turned his head to follow.and screamed.  
  
"He he," Ricky giggled, "he screams so funny." Shirley hit him in the arm.  
  
"Just when things go from bad to worse." Rose noticed Biff approaching, but yet not noticing the small audience observing them.  
  
"Not if I can help it." Jack hopped on the Hover Board. "Watch this."  
  
"Serious-" Rose gritted her teeth.  
  
"Repercussions!" He waved as zoomed off.  
  
"Hey, Pop!" Gary yelled. No wonder Christine was crazy. She was descended from the crazy guy on the flying board. Biff, Match, 3-D, and Skinhead jumped into Biff's car. This seemed oddly familiar.  
  
"Do you know what the repercussions of this can be?!" Doc shook Gary by the collar.  
  
"I can guess." Gary said rubbed his neck. *How are we going to explain this one?*  
  
Jack sliced through the war protest, leaving onlookers in awe. Biff's car followed him through the tower greens. Screams erupted through the center of town.  
  
Christine came whizzing around the block and was dragged into Lou's by a fleeing crowd.  
  
"Hey, get off of me!" She pushed past the eager crowd. "Hey, Tina!" She called, "What the hell's going on here?!"  
  
"That new kid riding some sort flying board, and Biff Tannen's chasing him." Tina pointed. "Look!" Christine tried for the door, but Lou's was packed inch to inch with people.  
  
"Who is he?" A voice asked.  
  
"I don't know!" shouted another.  
  
"That new guy!"  
  
"Yeah, Jack Taft!"  
  
Meanwhile outside, Gary, Doc, Shirley, Lizzy, and Ricky stood on the steps of the town hall below the broken clock tower, helpless to do anything.  
  
"What is that thing he's on? That's impossible!" Shirley shook her head in disbelief.  
  
"Where's Joey?" A voice shouted. A familiar figure in a mini-skirt and matching headband ran up the steps.  
  
"Where's your head?" Doc shook her by the shoulders, red hair flailing.  
  
"I didn't bust through any garages or steal any flying boards!" Rose yelled, selling out her granddaughter and future husband, granted she wasn't too thrilled with either of them.  
  
'Jack Taft' was whipping around the center of town turning corners, and narrowly avoiding Biff's car. He zoomed around a lamppost. Biff was trying to do the same, but his car scraped along the side.  
  
"You're paying for that!" He roared angrily. Jack turned around and smiled.  
  
Jack went around another lamppost this time grabbing on and swinging around once before leaving. Now it was just plain fun.  
  
Biff pumped the gas, growling. No one was going to make a fool of him-even though it had already happened a few times in public.  
  
Jack circled around the clock tower, with his family and friends yelling and screaming. He waved. Tannen's car followed close behind, tires screeching and scrawling.  
  
By now everyone was yelling and cheering inside of Lou's Diner. Christine had managed to climb over the crowd to a good view. She was sitting on a table counter in a booth with her hands and face pressed to the glass. From outside Jack was circling around the Tannen's car making spin around and knock over garbage cans.  
  
"That's my grandpa!" Christine shouted, thrusting her fist in the air. She looked around, realizing her mistake. "I mean cousin! Get 'em Jack!"  
  
Jack was flying high, but his fun was about to be spoiled. Tannen had got a gain on him. The car hit the end of the board, causing him to nearly fall off. Then he swooped around another lamppost-and whoosh! He turned his feet up nearly missing a truck.  
  
Actually, he only partly missed the truck. He hit the front on his stomach, letting out an agonizing groan, and grasped the hood ornament.  
  
Tannen and his compatriots didn't miss the car at all. He cut the wheel as hard as he could but it slammed into the side of the truck, with the contents from the crate spilling out into his convertible.  
  
The action came to a halt. Jack breathed hard, wincing in pain. He squinted his eyes to catch a glimpse of the driver.  
  
"Joey.?" he said weakly.  
  
"God damn it! Not again!" Biff furiously slammed his hands on the wheel. Jack looked around slowly, tenderly pulling himself up. Gee, it really stunk all of the sudden. Jack looked around again. "AGAIN?!"  
  
"Joe?" he said, still in a pain. "What possessed you to steal a manure truck?"  
  
"I don't know, just seemed like a good idea at the time."  
  
"That was brilliant!" Christine cheered running across the green.  
  
"That was absolutely fanatical!" Doc yelped, with Gary following.  
  
"That almost jeopardized my existence yet again." Gary shook his head.  
  
Jack felt a tug at his shirt as his girl dragged him down from the truck.  
  
"In more ways than one," Rose glanced, "what did you hit?"  
  
"See if you try making four kids after that!" Christine giggled.  
  
"*Four?*" Rose asked trying to keep cool, remembering Mrs. McFly in the car.  
  
"I'm fine." Jack wheezed, "just crushed my rip cage," he took a step, wincing, "and maybe a few vital organs."  
  
"The DeLorean's safe for now at least." Christine smiled.  
  
"We'd better get you two back to the house. We'll send you off tonight." Doc nodded, picking up the Hover Board.  
  
"You're paying for this, Taft! You too, Dawson!" Biff growled. Gary looked at his sister, and then at the four losers in the car.  
  
"Why? Nobody does else when they run you into a manure truck." Gary shrugged. The things that happened here. It was one crazy town, Hill Valley.  
  
"Hey, Dawson." Someone tapped him on the shoulder. Gary turned around. Butch: his worst nightmare since kindergarten. He stood up to him once before, why stop now? Christine gave him a nod. Although it had never been discussed, he knew what she knew what he wanted to do. She nodded again.  
  
"Oh my God, I'm so sick of this!" Gary shook his head in disgust, turning to Butch again.  
  
"Sick of what, dingleberry?" Butch stalked closer.  
  
"All of it." Gary looked him right in the eyes-and bam! He landed one right in the face. Butch went down with a single and thud and didn't move.  
  
There was silence. Gary turned to Butch's brother, who was fuming in the car and covered fertilizer.  
  
"Don't forget to bring it home." He pointed to Butch holding his bleeding nose on the ground. Shirley, Ricky, and little cousin Lizzy ran up after watching Gary drop Butch. Gary didn't say anything, he turned around slowly, and everyone else followed.  
  
He put his arm around Shirley and she gave him an odd look.  
  
"Added effect," he whispered, "just go with it." She smiled. Gary smiled bigger. It was for effect, too. But that was all she needed to know for now.  
  
"Now * that's* horseshit." Jack glanced back. Rose laughed to herself.  
  
Gary nodded at Christine. She nodded back. 


	15. Life and Death

*Where could it be?* Rose was crawling around near the clock tower looking for the 2001 newspaper she had dropped earlier that day. After all the excitement she forgot about the paper and lost it when Jack was whizzing around on that crazy pink board.  
  
Doc nearly had a seizure when he found out she had lost it. No one would believe it was real anyway and if it survived 33 years to when the paper was actually printed. People would just think it was some urban myth or something.  
  
It was nearly midnight and the town of Hill Valley was dead. And she was tired-and not just tired but sleepy. She walked passed a trashcan on her right and strolled back to it. She reached down through a couple of newspapers, looking through dates and articles.  
  
"MLK, LBJ, RFK.April 8, 1968.no, that's yesterday's." Rose tossed it back in, "Nicole Kidman, Osama Bin Laden.2001! Yes!" Those names had even less meaning to her than the others except that they meant she had found the right one and she could go home. And it was all in one piece! "Rose DeWitt Bukater and her excellent tracking skills," she commended herself.  
  
She twirled around and knocked into someone. Biff. She just slouched and gave a dirty look.  
  
"Move along; I'm tired." She pushed passed him. He grabbed her arm. "Let go, jerk."  
  
"Nobody makes a fool out of Biff Tannen! NOBODY!" He screamed. She wiped the spit from her face. "Now you and your friends are going to PAY!" Did he always have to scream like that?  
  
"The spitting when you yell is very unflattering. Besides, it wasn't that me that fertilized your car. Leave me alone."  
  
"You tell where you and your little boyfriend come fom and tell me where that flying car is and I'll leave you alone."  
  
"Don't hold your breath." She tried to pull her arm free, but he was too strong. Rose found this especially frustrating and degrading now that she gotten of whiff of women's lib in the sixties. "Let go!" She kicked him in the shin and ran away.  
  
Rose ran around the side of the building and tried to pry open the backdoor. It was no use. She didn't know what he wanted. What was she so afraid of? How badly would he hurt her? He might kill her; he was the town's ex-bully looking for a new hook. Maybe he'd do something worse. With that thought she pulled harder.  
  
"Come on! Come on!"  
  
She reached down and picked up an empty flowerpot in the garden running along the side of the building. She slammed it into the window. It cracked but it wasn't good enough. She stood back as she heard footsteps coming closer. She heaved the pot at the window smashing through the glass and setting off the alarm.  
  
With Biff coming around the corner she pulled herself up and through the window, slicing her hand on broken glass.  
  
Biff reached through and grabbed her arm. Rose screamed and ripped herself free and bolted for the stairs.  
  
***  
  
Doc's Garage  
  
Rose hadn't come back yet and it was a little after midnight. Gary and Jack had been cleaning up the mess for hours after everyone else left and agreed that they would stop as soon as Rose returned.  
  
"I'm so tired my eyes are starting to fuzz out." Gary sighed. "Tell me about Paris again."  
  
"Again?" Jack asked as he heaved a box of spare parts back onto the workbench.  
  
"Yeah, you give juicier details like this, you hold back a little when you're old.either that or your embellishing."  
  
"Well, that's for your interpretation."  
  
"I need those stories. I've never had a real adventure. I'm eighteen, never left my home country, never gone farther than making out or had a regular girlfriend. All this I managed to achieve during a sexual revolution. It's tough when your sister get more than you do, too."  
  
"You're having a hell of an adventure now. Almost nobody's done what we're doing."  
  
"I know that's why I keep bugging you, how long am I going to have you around like this? It's pretty amazing being friends with your grandparents like they were your really cool brother and sister.and you've met one of my sisters." Gary laughed.  
  
"Hey, those sisters of yours stem from my sperm I'll have you know."  
  
"Well, see what happens to those after that hit you took today." Jack through a towel at him. "Hey, I've been looking for these forever!"  
  
"What?" asked Jack.  
  
"I'm over here so much I leave a lot of stuff around. It's most of my copies of The Fantastic Four and Spider-Man!  
  
"Picture magazines?" Jack picked one up curiously.  
  
"No," said Gary, ".comic books." He looked at Jack. ".wait about ten or fifteen years."  
  
"One of the many things I have to look forward to."  
  
"Yes my friend, the greatest.want a warning about the future?"  
  
"Doc said it wasn't a good idea."  
  
"Okay, just telling you not to piss of Nana so much.she's scary when she's mad."  
  
"I've gotten the impression she's a little feisty." Jack winked and looked at his grandson. "Where is she anyway? I think we might want to look for her. Probably got lost." He expected to see him smiling-but he had turned dead pale in an instant. "What is it?"  
  
"What's happening, Jack?"  
  
"Gary what?"  
  
Gary lifted his arm. His hand was beginning to disappear.  
  
"Holy shit!" Jack grabbed Gary's arm. His hand was fading into thin air.  
  
"What's happening?!" Gary struggled from his grip in a panic. "My hand's going! I don't feel anything!"  
  
"I know! I know! Stop panicking!"  
  
"You stop panicking!" Gary growled and started crying. Time travel he hadn't believed but had heard of.body parts vaporizing he couldn't possibly comprehend. It didn't tingle. It didn't hurt. There just wasn't anything there anymore.  
  
"Get up, we're gonna go get Doc!" Jack grabbed Gary's shirt and tried pulling him up. By now he didn't have a left arm.  
  
"No! No!"  
  
"Come on!" he roared. He had his arms around his grandson trying to calm him. "Come on, buddy you'll be alright."  
  
"Don't touch me! Get off, please!" Gary cried.  
  
"I'm not leaving you, but we gotta get help!" Jack ran around the room shoving his head through the window. "Doc!" he yelled, "DOC! We need help!"  
  
He turned around and slammed his hand on the windowpane. He looked back out the window, but stopped. He turned around again slowly. Gary had gotten quiet. He was gone and so was his box of comics. There wasn't a single trace of him left.  
  
Jack felt very cold. Doc had told him and it was the reason why he was here. People disappeared when something in history stopped them from being born. In the first misadventure with time travel George and Lorraine McFly had almost not gotten together, therefore Marty McFly had seen his own hand fade away, or so Jack had been told. And the twins' niece, Jennifer, Jack's great granddaughter, it was her disappearance that sent them in search of Jack. In some alternate world he himself had died at nineteen on Titanic and Jennifer vanished because Jack had died.  
  
Somebody was dead.  
  
***  
  
Fifteen minutes earlier  
  
Rose ran up the stairs as Biff climbed through the broken window. The alarm was ringing the police had to be on their way. She couldn't out run him. All she could do now was hide until the authorities found her.  
  
With Biff's reputation they would arrest him and not her. Besides if she did get into a mess she was going to be 56 years away soon.  
  
When she had nearly she reached the top she saw Biff already halfway up the stairs. Rose tripped and took a nosedive when she turned back around to run.  
  
Biff paused to pick up a piece of newspaper on one of the landings. Rose held her breath still on the floor. She was missing half of the paper.  
  
"2001?" Biff looked at her. "I knew there was something with you! I've seen this kind of stuff before, girly!"  
  
Rose reached for the door at the top of the stairs only to find more stairs. She ran up and opened the door quietly closing it behind her. It was as far as she could go she looked for a place to hide.  
  
She dabbed the palm of her hand on her shirt. It was bleeding very badly.  
  
Rose opened a little black door to find herself looking out on the center of town. She looked back into the room. She was in such a panic she didn't notice. She was inside the clock.  
  
She heard the other door open and Biff's footsteps marched up the stairs.  
  
"Shit!" she hissed and looked through the door again. She moved her good hand out along the edge. It wasn't very wide, but it was her last chance.  
  
She stepped out along the edge nearly plastering herself to the wall so as not to fall off.  
  
*Wait for the police. Wait till he leaves.* She tried to calm herself down so that she could balance. She inched herself along away from the door. She stopped and exhaled deeply.  
  
The door burst open with a sudden slam. Rose screamed and lost her balance.  
  
Just in time she grabbed one the clock hands. She struggled for a moment as Biff reached for her.  
  
"You give me the rest of that newspaper," he offered, "I'll help you back over."  
  
Rose was hanging on for her life looked up at paper as she kicked and tried to grip the edge with her feet. She had been gripping it with her sliced hand and it was dripping red now.  
  
Rose looked at Biff and pulled her hand off of the bigger black metal hand. She released the newspaper.  
  
She pulled herself up more wrapping her arms the hour hand. Biff watched the paper plummet to the ground as cop cars pulled in.  
  
"Go get it!" Rose sneered through her teeth.  
  
"You bitch!"  
  
"Pull her in! Hang on, miss!" shouted a megaphone.  
  
Rose could hear sirens and saw lights flashing red and blue down below her. Her heart was racing. She had been deep inside the bowels of the great Titanic when it was sinking. She trekked through icy waters nearly reaching over her head with nothing but an ax.  
  
But now it was just she, not a thousand others. Only Rose was hanging from the clock tower. Rose would be the only one to die tonight. After a moment all she could hear was her own breathing and heartbeat.  
  
*The police are here.* She reminded herself. Help was on the way. She would survive this one, too.  
  
Breaking the her inner silence, Biff's hand reached for her arm, maybe this time now that the law was here, to save her. Rose screeched in a wild panic, losing her grip.  
  
Everything was ripped away and she was airborne. She screamed again wretchedly. There was a great, forceful pain and then.nothing. 


	16. To the Rescue

Jack and Doc flew out of the car and raced across the tower green.  
  
"Rose!" Jack called. A few faces in uniform turned around. They were gathered at the front steps of the town hall.  
  
Jack pushed his way through the police and small crowd. He was about to call her name once again. But he couldn't speak.  
  
Lying on the stairs drenched in red was a twisted, tangled body. It was Rose.  
  
Jack maniacally pushed through those holding him back. And went to Rose. He touched her face and then her neck. There was no pulse.  
  
"No, Rose, no!" he cried, barely able to speak. He voiced cracked. This was the girl of his dreams, the woman he loved, and his friend, the one he was going to have a life with.  
  
Now she was an agonizing, bloody mess. She barely looked real. She wasn't even in the right time. The Rose from 1968 was seventy-three years old and alive. This Rose was barely eighteen, and she was dead. She had only died moments ago. A few minutes ago she was alive and healthy. Now she was dead and she took entire generations of their family with her.  
  
Jack looked up from his girlfriend's lifeless body to see Biff being cuffed and loaded into a police car. He uncurled his hand from her hair and set her head back down. He was burning with rage.  
  
Doc put a hand on his shoulder. He turned slightly unable to bare the emotional nor the physical sight of young Rose.  
  
"The DeLorean." Doc whispered so that only Jack could here. "They'll want to ask us questions. After that we'll get in the DeLorean. This isn't going to stay as is. Do you understand me, Jack?"  
  
Jack slowly stood up. In his grief and panic he hadn't seen. He knew that very soon he would be in this exact spot, on this exact day, at this exact time.and Rose would be fine. She would be perfectly fine.  
  
The cops wanted to ask them how they knew and where they last saw her alive and about a billion others questions. They were there for almost an hour. In the back of his head Jack knew Rose would be fine, but until then she was dead. As they stood she was just a body. Dead and never coming back. He could barely take it. He wanted to leave so badly he felt his legs contracting and his stomach twisting. He knew he had access to something that would save her. But for now, dead is dead.  
  
When they were finally released and told how sorry everyone was for their loss, Jack and Doc hopped back into Doc's car and sped back home.  
  
Christine had returned the time machine earlier that day after busting through and nearly destroying his garage. Now Doc climbed in his invention that he hadn't really invented yet.  
  
History had to be set straight once more. Doc felt he owed the world a favor, too. He had a letter hidden away in his house; it was rain-damaged and taped back together. Somewhere in the back of his head he knew terrorists were going to put a bullet through him on October 26, 1985.  
  
With that knowledge he knew he could save his own life. Now it was time to do that for someone else.  
  
"This again." Jack closed the door of the DeLorean.  
  
"Time to fly." Doc said as he set the time for 12:00 AM, April 10, 1968. There were a few new settings from the last time he saw the time machine so he left those alone. "You done this before you know the drill."  
  
"Drill? We accidentally sat on one the controls."  
  
"It's simple." Doc pulled out on to the empty road and took the DeLorean off the ground.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Hold on to your ass."  
  
***  
  
"You give me the rest of that newspaper," he offered, "I'll help you back over."  
  
Rose was hanging on for her life looked up at paper as she kicked and tried to grip the edge with her feet. She had been gripping it with her sliced hand and it was dripping red now.  
  
Rose looked at Biff and pulled her hand off of the bigger black metal hand. She released the newspaper.  
  
But Rose didn't hear the newspaper flapping in the wind and plummeting to the ground. She heard a thud. The paper landed not more than a foot under her.  
  
"What the." Biff could see. He dropped his half of the paper. It made a thud as well.  
  
Rose strained to look down. Kicking her feet, she could feel something under them. She saw gray mental. The DeLorean!  
  
Rose let go of the clock and fell backward on to the car. She bumped her butt pretty hard, but otherwise she was okay.  
  
She turned around to see Jack and Doc waving. Jack couldn't believe it. Minutes ago she was lying dead on the ground below. Now she was perfectly fine, very confused, but alive.  
  
Rose waved the newspaper in front of Doc and gripped the hood where it met the windshield.  
  
The DeLorean departed leaving Biff with his mouth hanging open. It wasn't the first time crazy Doc Brown and his weird friends had screwed him over. But it didn't mean he understood it any better.  
  
Two police cars turned the corner toward the clock tower. The first one suddenly slammed on its breaks and the other followed suit.  
  
One officer got out of the second car.  
  
"Hey, Don, what you do that-?" He looked up.  
  
"Mac, is that car.flying?" said his associate from the first car.  
  
"Uh, yeah, Don. I think that car's flying." Another officer stepped out of the second squad car.  
  
"Is that Biff Tannen up there?" asked the Sarge.  
  
"Most likely." said Mac.  
  
They all shrugged and went to arrest Biff. After all, this was Hill Valley. Things like this happened all the time.  
  
***  
  
"How did you know?" Rose asked after they landed in Doc's yard.  
  
"Long story. We'll tell you in a minute Jack put his arm around her and they went into the garage.  
  
Gary was there with the Fantastic Four and Spider-Man. He was confused, too. He remembered sitting there with Jack. The next thing he knew he and the time machine were gone.  
  
"Did I miss something?" Gary looked up. 


	17. Escape!

"What did you people do?" Christine barged into the garage. At first she went unheard. Doc and Jack were too relieved and tired. Gary and Rose were still trying to process everything they had just been told. "Hey, people!"  
  
Gary blinked a few times then looked at his sister. "What?"  
  
"Flying cars in the middle of town ring a bell? The police will be here any minute! What are we supposed to tell them? Who knows what they'll do?" She waved her arms.  
  
"Great Scott!" Doc scrambled out the door. "We need to get you two home!" He looked at Rose and Jack.  
  
"You know we keep hearing that everyday, but I'm beginning to wonder..." said Jack.  
  
"Do you have all you're things?" Doc asked urgently, glancing out the window for police cars. Gary stood up and exchanged looks with Christine. It was too sudden and too soon. They didn't want them to go.  
  
"Wha--yes." Rose answered, flustered. "Now?"  
  
"We've got to get you out of here!" He grabbed her by the shoulders. "We've got to destroy any evidence of the time machine and get you two as far away as possible--and 1912 is pretty damn far."  
  
Jack looked back at his grandchildren. This was good-bye for a very long time.  
  
"Aw, crap." Christine looked out the window. Police.   
  
"'Aw, crap' is right." Her brother came to her side. "I guess this isn't the day for savored farewells." He sighed.  
  
"No, this is the day for lightening fast escapes." Jack put his hand on his shoulder. "You done good, both of you." Jack smiled at him, proud. A few days ago Gary had been shy around girls and bullies alike. Christine had been obnoxious and uncaring--but only on the outside. With each other and their young grandparents they busted threw their own insecurities. Somehow they're opposite personalities had found a little bit of middle ground.  
  
"See you around, guys." Christine hugged Rose. She slipped something into her pocket but Rose didn't notice.  
  
"Another fifty-six years?" Rose pulled away.  
  
"Actually, you two are supposed to be home in a few days." Gary nodded, remembering his grandparents were on vacation.  
  
Jack grinned. "Yeah, but we'll have to wait a little longer."  
  
"Don't worry," said Chris, "we'll be here."  
  
Doc came in and placed his hands on the shoulders of the young Dawsons. "Ready?"  
  
"As close as I'll ever be." Rose let out a short breath. "Jack?" She turned to him.  
  
He mustered up a little strength. "Let's go."  
  
"You know what to do." Doc looked at the "older" Dawsons.  
  
"That we do." said Jack, looking at the DeLorean. He took Chris and Gare and hugged them both, Doc and Rose joined in for a final group hug.  
  
"Tell Fabrizio--" Jack began, remembering his aged best friend. He had seen little of him or Helga in the last few days in 1968.  
  
"I know." Doc nodded.   
  
***  
  
Doc cut across the yard as Jack and Rose backed out of the garage in darkness. Gary and Christine kept watch. Rose was driving this time. After the fiasco with Mrs. McFly Jack wouldn't get behind the wheel of a car--with Rose's consent--until 1915.  
  
Slowly without lights, Rose drove through the grass, taking the long way toward to road. The twins watched on, nervously. The plan had to go right *this* time. As much as they liked having them they liked existing too.  
  
The DeLorean pulled on to the road. It was 4 AM. The sun would be up in just a few short hours. In just a few short minutes Jack and Rose would leave the 60's behind for more than five decades.  
  
"I think we can turn the lights on, don't you?" Jack suggested.  
  
Rose sighed, she looked around to see if the coast was clear. It was. "Okay." she agreed.  
  
She flicked the headlights on, illuminating the dark road ahead. Everything seemed so peaceful now, so quiet and tranquil. It was hard to believe how much that would change in a moment.  
  
"Time to fly?" Jack prepped her.  
  
Just then alien lights appeared ahead. It was another car. Rose said nothing, merely raised an eyebrow. Rose had on her determined face. That's how Jack knew they were going to make it home this time.  
  
It was Biff's car. In it was Biff, Butch, and Biff's goons, including that Cal look-alike.  
  
"Time to take out the trash!" She said through her teeth. Jack recalled the other day over-hearing Doc and Gary. Doc warned of the explosive effects of "taking two non-conservative people from a very conservative world and throwing them into a very *non*-conservative world." Jack knew from the hover-board incident how it had played out on him. Now he was about to see how it played out on Rose. Hey, Doc was lucky they weren't running threw the streets naked carrying out pagan rituals.  
  
"Hold on to that cute little butt of yours." Rose warned. "It's going to be a fast ride."  
  
Okay, Jack was definitely seeing the effects of the 60's on the his first class, post-Victorian Rose now. Although he had to admit he found it pretty sexy, but now it was pretty frightening.  
  
She switched gears and slammed on the gas. Jack grabbed the dashboard. He reminded himself he'd seen worse before.  
  
The car screeched and Jack could feel his body being pulled back as they surged forward, closer and closer to Biff's car. She was charging directly at them.  
  
"Rose, what are you doing!?" Jack yelled, it was first time he had yelled at her like that, she didn't react. She was staring right ahead.  
  
"Oh my God!" shouted Butch.  
  
"Biff, we got to move!" Match called in a panic as they began spilling out the car and scattering. The headlights of the DeLorean were shining on them. There was nowhere to hide.  
  
"Come on, 79...82...85..." she mumbled biting the the corner of her lip. She was looking at the speedometer. "Take a deep breath, Jack." She shouted, this time showing some emotion, anticipation and wide-eyed fear.  
  
Biff, Butch, and company screamed as the car zoomed straight toward them. Lightening flashed all around the car and in a flash...it was gone.  
  
The men kept screaming in terror for nearly a minute until they realized that they were alive...and that car had...disappeared? They stared in awe looking ahead and at each other in disbelief. Except for Biff of course. He grumbled and kicked the side of his car. This was nothing new to him.  
  
***  
  
Marty and Jennifer McFly stood out on deck staring into the moonless night. They had watch history happen, but they didn't feel enlightened, just worried. It had been about fifteen minutes since Jack and Rose disappeared. But they had to be okay. After all, Jennifer was still here.  
  
"Marty, look." She pointed in the distance. There was a light, it looked like a commercial jet back home in good old 1996, but they knew it could only be one thing. "They must have missed they're mark." she laughed with relief.  
  
Marty smiled big with his mouth open. They were back. And he could go home. "Hey, guys!" He called. "Guess who decided to drop by!"  
  
Doc, Clara, Jules and Verne stumbled out with Helga and Fabrizio in tow.  
  
"Dude," Verne said to a very bewildered Fabri, "those are your friends." He pointed. 


	18. Coming Home

They were gone. A noise in the distance, a little flash of light and the adventure was over. Jack and Rose went back home. Gary couldn't help but worry if they'd made it back alright, but he was living proof of that.   
  
Christine put her arm around her twin brother and gave him a little squeeze. "Come on," she said with sisterly affection, "let's go home."  
  
"Let's go home." Gary echoed.  
  
The Dawson Twins walked back to their car in peaceful silence, swinging the arms back in worth--oblivious to the fact that they walked in perfect unison. They were more alike than they thought. The police had left Doc alone, they thought they had the time machine cornered when they saw the flash at the end of the road. Doc was just getting in the house. They waved to him as they got in and headed for home.  
  
As they crept into the house, careful not to wake their parents. They stopped in front of a few pictures of their grandparents. Christine smiled.  
  
"Look at those two kids." She said pointed at the picture of their wedding.  
  
"Yeah," Gary looked at the adjacent photo of their fifieth anniversary, "a couple of kids."  
  
***  
  
April 17, 1912  
  
Jack and Rose were back to familiar surroundings. Well, almost familiar surroudings. They were in a field in Upstate New York so as to hide the time machine.  
  
"Glad to be back?" Doc asked. He was the only one who had been there through their whole ordeal with them.   
  
Jack sighed, "Ya know, it was one of those adventures every little boy dreams of, now it's over and I we have to return to normal life. Whatever that is."  
  
"It's whatever you make it!" Doc patted him on the shoulder. He smiled sadly. It might be the last time he ever saw them. When he returned to 1996 there would be no more Jack and Rose Dawson. But it was good to know, that somewhere in some time, they would always be there.   
  
He climbed into the DeLorean, the last of his team to leave. He saluted the young couple. And pulled out and up. As the time machine lifted off Jack and Rose headed toward the train station to go back to the city.  
  
***  
  
April 18, 1912, 9:00 PM  
  
Rose and Jack arrived at Pier 54 in clean clothes and well-rested as the Titanic survivors stepped off the Carpathia. It didn't seem fair. But they been through the sinking, too. Although admittedly, they had a little bit of a break.  
  
It was a strange feeling. Being thrown back into the world they had left after all that. Now it was time to get down to business, pick up the pieces, and carry on.  
  
"See anybody?" Rose struggled through the crowd amidst the dark and the rain.  
  
"I see lots of people..." Jack answered.  
  
"Familiar people, I mean"  
  
"I see lots of those, too." All of their blank, pallid faces. Jack had seen them around those few days on Titanic. Some he had talked to about the weather, or his drawings, or how about that Mary Pickford, isn't she adorable? Now they were like ghosts, those who were still alive that is.  
  
"Jack!" A voice called from the crowd. Jack turned around working his way through the confusion. "Jack!" the voice called.  
  
"Fabrizio!" He cheered, pushing threw the mass of people and dragging Rose with him. "Fabrizio!"  
  
"Jack!"  
  
"Fabrizio!"  
  
"Jack!"  
  
"Fabrizio!"  
  
"Okay!" Rose shouted over them, cutting them off with her hands. "...sorry," she shrugged, "had to be done." Helga came up along side Fabri.  
  
"Fabri," Jack said, too excited for words, "you look so...so...young!"   
  
"I don't know what you mean, but I take it as hello." Fabri slapped him on the back.  
  
"Glad to see you're both fine." Rose said. Helga smiled weakly. She didn't speak much English, and she was at loss for in her native tongue after all that happened. Not even Fabri knew just what a little pip she could be.  
  
"Hey, Fabri..." Jack began.  
  
"Yes?" his friend waited.  
  
"What happened to Tommy?"  
  
Fabrizio hung his head low, and gave him a little nod for "no." They automactically bowed their heads. Jack smiled sadly, remembering the boisterious, lovable Irishman. He had only known him for a few days, but he and Fabrizio were best friends by the end of the very day they met. Jack sighed, he had lost another friend. He didn't ask how. For now at least he didn't want to know.  
  
Fabrizio forced a reassuring smile. For the first time he realized they weren't invincable anymore. Even the young and strong can die. Tommy Ryan was dead.  
  
A hand fell on Rose's shoulder, she whipped around. It was her mother. Rose stared. Everyone else held their breath.  
  
"I thought your friend might be wanting this, Rose." Ruth looked at Jack and pulled out something from under her coat. His portfolio. Jack took it nervously from her outstretched hand.  
  
"Mother...how did you...?" Rose was puzzled.  
  
Ruth stared into her daughter's face. For now she couldn't tell her how much Titanic had changed in just a few short hours. She could see how Rose had changed. She looked older and wiser, but calmer...sadder. But nothing in her eyes was broken anymore. Her face was tanner, though she wasn't sure how, but there was no look of frustration or despair. Rose was a new breed of woman. She was harder, but she always looked ready for anything.  
  
"Don't ask, darling," said her mother, "just accept, I know I have." She pulled her daughter in for an embrace, but didn't stay long. "We'll be staying here and you know where home is. The door will be open." She nodded. "I'll be on my way."  
  
Jack looked in shock as Ruth walked through the crowd, still a little weary of the hoards of other people, trying not to come into physical contact with the unwashed masses. Some things would never change.  
  
"What was...that?" Jack turned to Rose.  
  
"I never needed her approval, but now I have her acceptance...it's a start and she knows it." She nodded knowingly.  
  
"Jack?" yelled another voice, cutting through the silence. A little girl of about 12 looked at him trying to discern him. After a moment she decided it was him.  
  
She ran into Jack's arms. It was the girl in the picture of De Rossi's Ristorante. It was Jack little cousin, Emily. They had both grown and aged but they could tell each other from any double.  
  
"Emily!" he hugged her, lifting her off the ground. "Look at you!"  
  
Behind the girl came her parents, Jack's aunt and uncle Rose presumed.  
  
"Kiddo!" shouted the man.  
  
"Jackie!" shouted the woman. She smiled at the image of the four of them. The Dawson family was back together again.  
  
"There's someone--" Jack cut himself off, "there's a few someones I'd like you to meet."  
  
***  
  
Like the lost boys being packed into the Darling household, Jack's aunt and uncle had four extra people sleeping under their roof, it was a madhouse and the young couple needed to get out if only for a few hours. It was only two days since they had returned to 1912, but there would always be a little bit of the sixties in them.  
  
"We should get home, this is a dangerous neighborhood to be out so late." Rose suggested to her man and she affectionately held his hand.  
  
"We're dangerous people." Jack said. "None of the miscrients around here have ever floored a car at 88 miles per hour at another human being."  
  
"Hey, you had that fiasco with the board in the center of town...that was mine."  
  
Just then he whirled her around and pulled her right in front of him. "What are you doing?" she asked. He said nothing, he pulled her to his face and kissed her deeply. He broke away after a few minutes. He wrapped his arms around the small of her back and started swinging her gently.  
  
"I just realized," he said, "I haven't done that in a while."  
  
"Crazy week, we had other distrations...you know what else we haven't done in a while..."  
  
"Oh, don't you go destroying my virtue, Miss DeWitt Bukater, we're not married." He scratched his chin, pretending to think. "Hey, I got it! Marry me!" he lit up.  
  
"No," said Rose bluntly.  
  
"What?" Jack said, he was taken offguard.  
  
"You cheated. You already know we're getting married. Knowing the future, where's the romance in that?" she grinned evilly. Jack breathed, she was kidding. She really scared him for a second.  
  
"Good thing then. Gary and Christine would be *really* upset."  
  
"No they wouldn't," Rose argued, "there would be no one to be upset...fine, but I keep my name."  
  
"The press will be all over you," he warned. "Why, how many women do you know that stick with their maiden name after they're married?"  
  
"One at least. I don't care about the press. If they know I'm alive the press will get bored eventually and Cal...I've got no money, nothing, there's nothing for which he can touch me. And I've always been Rose DeWitt Bukater, it's my identity. That, my darling man, is *me.* I don't have anything to hide, I don't want anything to hide. If I can't face the world as myself I won't face it at all. And that's not Women's Lib talking, that's *me.*" She ended her speech.  
  
"That all?" he smiled and kissed her hand, he really didn't care about the name.  
  
"No," she said, she put her finger on his nose as she inched closer, "mine name is much cooler than yours." she was barely containing laughter. Jack didn't contain his. She latched on to the lapels of his jacket. "Let's go home, buster." She pulled him forward as she walked.  
  
"No, wait! I gotta get you a ring first!" he pulled her in the other direction.  
  
"There's nothing open!" she laughed and pulled him the other way.  
  
They ran home hand in hand, laughing like children. When they reached the door Rose searched in her coat pocket for the key. "What's this?" she wondered pulling something unfamiliar out. A necklace.  
  
"Isn't that Christine's?" Jack lifted the little peace sign from her hand.  
  
"Yeah, it is." she mused.  
  
***  
  
April 10, 1968 4:43 AM  
  
Doc closed the front door with a sigh of relief. Another out of time adventure--or near disaster, depending on his mood, was laid to rest. In another 17 years he knew he was in for one with Marty McFly. As for the rest, well, he couldn't predict the future... 


	19. Epilogue

Jack and Rose married in October 1912, shortly after Fabrizio and Helga. The four of them, with Jack's aunt, uncle, and cousin, moved to Hill Valley, California in the spring of 1914.  
  
Jack helped the De Rossi's to open their restaurant working as assistant manager for two years while attending college. Jack was an officer during the First World War and received a Silver Star for his bravery at Argonne. When he returned home he began teaching at Hill Valley High School and became superintendent of the Hill Valley School district after 12 years. He never liked Strickland.  
  
Rose was a prominent leader in the Women's Rights Movement in California. She worked in several different fields, as an actress in New York, as a nurse and taught High School in Hill Valley. She worked a short stint as a pilot delivering mail across state until she became pregnant with their first child. After retirement she published three books.  
  
They had four children: Hannah born in 1915, Cora in 1918, Fiona in 1920, and David in 1921. They raised the four of them through the Depression and sent their youngest off to war.  
  
They remained in Hill Valley until their deaths in the 1990's.  
  
***  
  
The twins graduated just days after Robert Kennedy was assasinated. Both attended USC in the fall. While home from Christmas break they watched Apollo 11 land on the moon. Jack and Rose threw a party for it.  
  
Gary went to prom with Shirley Houlihan and they dated until college. He is a professor of US History at Hill Valley Community College and lives with his wife and daughter in Hill Valley.  
  
Christine was a big time publisher in Manhattan. She was married for a brief time in her twenties and never expressed any desire to do so again until she was reunited with Ricky De Rossi. They married in 1987 and live in New Jersey with their son and daughter.  
  
***  
  
As for Doc, Marty, Jennifer, and the rest of the gang. That's a whole other story...  
  
The End. 


End file.
